Tales From Gotham City: It was Ramirez
by alanish2
Summary: An ongoing story about what happens to Anna Ramirez after the events of The Dark Knight.
1. It was Ramirez 1

…**It was ****_Ramirez…_**

Smoke rose high into the blue morning sky from the still smouldering embers of the day before. It had been a day that no one in the city would forget. Any lingering façade of peace or stability had been torn down by a single man, and the people of Gotham had been shown something that they had spent many years denying; criminals were in control.

And they were getting worse.

Crowds still surrounded the site where Gotham Central used to stand. The people stood in silence as they watched the rubble being slowly swept away, and they reeled when each body was dragged out. These people were in shock.

It was a shock that had spread across the whole city – streets were empty, parents afraid to let their children out alone. Even in the darkest parts of the city there was a sense that things had gone too far.

And yet, even in these desperate times, when people's lives had been threatened and terror had spread like wildfire, in the battle for Gotham's soul, it was the people who had won. They had refused to sink to the level of their tormentors. They had risen above their fears.

But that was yesterday, and the memories of their victory were already fading. Lives were beginning to return to normal, and the people who had been so noble were now clamouring for someone to blame.

On the outskirts of Gotham, the evacuees from Gotham Central had congregated in an old abandoned warehouse. The warehouse stood as a reminder of the depression which had strangled the city ten years earlier, just one of the businesses which had been forced closed. Many of these buildings had been bought up by other companies since then – most often by Wayne Enterprises during its years of aggressive expansion – but many more remained empty.

The sick and injured sat huddled together on the floor, while the few doctors and paramedics who had followed them tried to treat whoever they could. Scattered around the entrance to the warehouse, the ambulances and the school buses which had been used in the evacuation stood empty. The room was eerily quiet, save for the occasional moan of pain.

One figure sat alone beside them, away from the crowd. Anna Ramirez was hurting. It was a pain that ate away down to her soul, and no matter how hard she tried she couldn't shut it out. She sat on the ground and leaned against the outside wall of the warehouse with her legs curled up against her chest and her head resting on her knees. Her jet black hair, usually tied back, hung loosely down to her shoulders, and hid her face.

She heard the footsteps coming towards her, but she didn't look up.

"Hey", a voice said close to her. She felt a hand touch her shoulder, and she slowly turned her head upwards. A man stood over her… one of the paramedics. When he saw her face, and the still open cut down her forehead, his face filled with concern. "Looks like you need stitches", he said as he knelt down in front of her.

Anna leant her head back against the wall and closed her eyes as he started to treat her wound. She flinched as the stiches pierced her skin, but she savoured the pain, and tried to use it to distract her from her guilt.

After a few minutes, the Paramedic stood back and looked her over. While he'd been applying the stitches to her face he hadn't been able to see her expression, but now that he had stood back he saw that she was almost in tears. "Hey", he said softly. When she didn't react, he knelt down in front of her. "I didn't hurt you, did I?"

She slowly turned her head to face him, and smiled weakly. "No", she replied, but her quivering voice betrayed her. She shook her head, and tried to shake herself out of the state she was in. "No, I'm fine", she repeated, her voice now more assured. She stood and looked into the overcrowded clinic. Though they'd salvaged as much equipment from the ruins of Gotham General as they could and brought it here, they were still under equipped and overcrowded.

Anna heard the sound of an engine approaching from behind. Another ambulance was slowly driving up towards the warehouse. It stopped maybe ten yards from where Ramirez stood. She watched as the paramedic who had been driving got out of the ambulance and moved around to the back. He opened the door, and four men climbed out. They were dressed in SWAT outfits, but they looked dazed, as though they barely knew where they were.

The man who had treated Anna looked at her, and he must have seen the expression on her face. "Just cuts and bruises", he said, reassuringly. "They were just in the wrong place and the wrong time".

Anna nodded, slowly. "How come these people can't be moved to another hospital?" she asked.

The Paramedic sighed and sat back. Anna hadn't paid him much attention until then, but she noticed the bags under his eyes, and the tired look on his face. "The other Gotham Hospitals are barely able to cope with the sickest of our patients", he replied. "There are over a hundred people here, I know, but it's barely half of those who were pulled out of Gotham General before it went down. Those who need the most urgent treatment took priority. The rest – like you, and these men – are mostly just cuts and bruises, maybe a broken bone here or there, which we can deal with here".

Ramirez nodded. That might explain why she couldn't see her mother there. She'd been worried… that they hadn't got her out before it happened. With everything that had happened to her – the things that she'd sacrificed and the people that she'd betrayed – she hadn't had time to find out about her mother, but now that things seemed to be over, she was close to panic. "Is there a list?" she asked. "Or any way to find out where a particular patient was taken?"

The paramedic stood, and smiled. "Sure", he breathed. "Follow me". He offered his hand and she took it, using it to help her stand up. He led her past the group of SWAT members, who had stopped close by while the paramedics worked on them. As they passed by, she felt her guilt grow – she didn't know exactly how these men had been injured, but she knew that it must have been in the line of duty. She avoided their gaze as she walked past, sure that if they looked her in the eyes they would be able to see her betrayal of everything they stood for.

They continued through the maze of abandoned buses, and stopped outside one of the dozen or so ambulances which had been left outside. Anything that could be moved had been stripped out of them, and had been used to turn the empty warehouse into a makeshift clinic. The paramedic climbed up into the back and then extended his hand toward Ramirez, smiling. She smiled back, though she had to force it, took his hand, and allowed him to help her up into the ambulance with him.

"The network is still working", he said as he pushed his way to the front of the ambulance. "All the information about our patients is on there". He climbed into the driver's seat and Ramirez sat down in the front passenger's seat. "I'm John, by the way", he said quickly before flashing her another smile.

"Anna", Ramirez replied. She watched him as he accessed the network from a small device next to the steering wheel. His face was contorted in a frown as he worked, and his hands were clumsy, and he often mis-hitting the key pad or made mistakes. Ramirez was anxious, but she forced herself to wait patiently for him to finish.

"What's the patient's name?" he asked without looking up.

"Julia", Ramirez answered quickly. "Julia Ramirez".

She saw his eyes dart to the side towards her as she said the name before they quickly shifted back to the screen. He entered the name, and then sat back. "It'll take a couple of minutes", he told her. "Is she a relation?"

Ramirez nodded vacantly. She stared out of the passenger window at the crowd of people around them. "My mother", she sighed. "She has bad cancer. I did… a lot of things I'm not proud of to get the money for her medical bills. I don't think I could handle it if she didn't make it out of Gotham General".

Why had she told him that? She didn't know – perhaps she needed to tell someone, and John seemed like he wanted to listen. Still… she regretted it the instant the words had left her mouth, and in the awkward moments of silence which followed, Anna was sure that John would start to ask questions which she knew she wouldn't be able to answer.

But the questions didn't come. Instead, John sat back in his chair, sighed and closed his eyes.

"When the cops found out that there was a bomb in a hospital, they told us straight away", he said. "The office sent the call out to every ambulance in the district. I was out alone – we're not meant to go out on our own, but my partner had a kind of emergency. Anyway, I heard the call come over the radio – _'There's a bomb in a hospital. We don't know which one. All units return to base to help with the evacuation'_.

"You know what I did?" Ramirez shook her head, slowly. "I went home". John looked at her, shame in his face. "I went home and I slept. Hell, so there was a bomb in a hospital –it wasn't my problem, right? The cops would deal with it. I'd been working for fourteen hours straight, and I needed to sleep. And I thought that was more important than doing my part".

He stopped talking for a while, and the two sat in silence. Eventually, Ramirez was the one to speak. "So… what? You're ashamed?" she said bitterly. "You should be. You could have saved a life, and you didn't. I can't forgive you, and I wouldn't if I could". Anna knew the words were cruel. She was saying them to herself as much as to him.

John's face contorted as the guilt flooded over his face. "My point is", he said softly. "Everyone makes mistakes. Some people – like me – make big ones, and people suffer because of them. But we can't go back and change anything; we have to live with what we've done. I, for one, plan on doing everything I can to help people from now on. You say you've done things you're not proud of? So what are you going to do about it?"

Ramirez closed her eyes. "I don't know", she admitted. "Every time I close my eyes I see the faces of the people I've hurt, and I don't know if I can cope with it".

Suddenly, she was interrupted by a beeping sound coming from the device in the ambulance. John leaned forward and hit a few buttons. "It's found your mother", he said. "She's in Robinson Community, in South Gotham".

Relief flooded over Ramirez, and she started to cry. She wiped her face with her hands, and tried to hide her tears. John watched her crying, but he didn't move to comfort her. "Look", he said eventually. "Maybe you should take everything that's happened as a sign. You've been given a second chance, so make the most of it. Hell, you should be thankful that all you got was a bang on the head, and the Batman didn't kill you like he killed the others".

Ramirez's brow wrinkled up as she processed what John had just said. The Batman? Where had that come from? She was about to speak, to ask him what he was talking about, to tell him that it was Harvey Dent who had attacked her, when there was a loud tap on the windshield of the ambulance. It was Stephens. He still wore the same wrinkled, grumpy face that he always had, but now he had added a bandage around his neck where the Joker had cut him with his knife.

Ramirez wound the passenger window down. "Hey", she said softly, though inside she was dreading what she knew was about to happen.

Stephens smiled weakly. "Anna", he said. "The Commissioner wants to talk to you, and I don't think it'll wait".

Anna closed her eyes. This was it, she thought.


	2. It was Ramirez 2

Ramirez took the hot mug of coffee gratefully, and clutched it close to her chest. The office that Stephens had taken her to was so _cold_, she didn't understand why the heaters weren't switched on. She sat there shivering, and watched Stephens as he walked back out of the room. Anna was left alone again.

She looked around the room, at the cluttered desk in front of her and the empty chair opposite. She knew that soon a man she had looked up to since she first became a cop would be sat in that chair. Anna dreaded seeing the look of disappointment in his eyes. _He trusted me_, she thought to herself, _and I almost got his wife and his children killed._ She took a small sip of her coffee, and tried to ignore the voices in her head.

_What should I tell him?_ She asked herself. _Should I lie? I can't come clean… I'd be locked up, and he'd throw away the key. But he must _know_, how could he not? Harvey Dent came looking for _me_, and he'll want to know why._

There was a loud bang to her side as the office door flew open and Gordon strolled in. He paused momentarily to look Ramirez over, his gaze lingering on the stitches in her face. Then he silently walked to the other side of the desk and sat down in the leather chair. He leant forward and put his elbows on the desk, and rested his face on his hands. For the longest time neither of them spoke. The tension in the room to grew and grew until Anna thought that she might drown in it.

Finally, mercifully, Gordon spoke. "How's your face?" he asked, his voice straining to sound warm.

Ramirez forced a smile. "It's fine, thanks", she answered. Then she swallowed, nervously. "How… how are the family?"

Gordon's moustache bristled, and his eyes lowered. "They're fine", he replied. "Or they were the last time I saw them. Barbara took the kids and left last night. She was horrified by what happened, and I don't blame her in the slightest. I don't think James really understands how much danger he was in, but Barbara… She didn't even hesitate. They've moved to Cleveland – we have relatives up there, and I think they'll be alright. He leaned back and rubbed his face. Ramirez realised then just how… tired he looked. As though he was carrying the weight of the city on his shoulders. "But they're not hurt, which is the main thing".

Ramirez's eyes were filling with water, and she found herself unable to cope with the guilt. "I'm sorry, Jim", she said, as her voice wavered. "I'm so –"

"Why did Harvey go after you?" Gordon interrupted. Ramirez didn't answer; she just looked down at her feet. Gordon decided to prompt her. "He needed someone that my family trusted… didn't he?"

Ramirez looked up. She realised that Gordon had given her a way out... but why would he, unless it was a trap? She nodded vigorously. "That's right", she said quickly. "He had a gun to my head, Jim. I don't… I didn't want to do it…"

"I know, Anna", Gordon said. Anna tried to read his face, but his hands were covering his mouth and his eyes were... empty, as though his mind wasn't with them in the room. "It's OK. It's OK".

Ramirez was close to hysterics now. "He _forced _me to Jim!" she cried. "He was crazy! He was saying that he thought it was me who sold him out an-"

"Was it?" Gordon interrupted, calmly. Ramirez only looked at him with a blank expression. Gordon's voice was calm, but, for the first time, Anna sensed that there was rage boiling underneath the surface.

Ramirez's blank expression hid the conflict inside her mind. This was the moment that she had been dreading, the moment when she had to make a direct choice between coming clean or digging an even deeper hole for herself. And even though she hated herself for it, she couldn't work up the courage to come clean. "No", she replied. "No… it wasn't me. I swear it".

Gordon nodded, as though her answer was enough for him to believe her. "OK", he said, though he didn't meet her gaze. "If you say it then I believe you". Finally – reluctantly – he looked her in the eyes, met her gaze and forced a smile. Ramirez sighed inside with relief, but part of her – perhaps a bigger part than she would admit, even to herself – was angry with him for believing her. She deserved to be punished, didn't she? If she can get away with something like this, then what was there to stop anybody else from doing the same?

She returned his forced smile. "Thank you, Jim", she said, and took a long swig of her coffee before setting her cup down on the table. "Is there anything else? It's just… I'd like to go to my mother, if that's OK".

Gordon nodded in understanding, but he wasn't finished. "There's something important we need to talk about", he told her, his voice suddenly cold and emotionless. "About the_Batman_".

Ramirez nodded. On the way over there she'd heard snippets of conversations or news broadcasts that talked about the _Batman_ – that he'd murdered six people, including Harvey Dent and two cops. She knew it was bullshit – Harvey killed those people, and Gordon above all people knew it too.

"Harvey was…" Gordon said after a long pause. "Harvey _is_ a beacon of light for this city. A _hero_. Whatever happened towards the end was… it wasn't his fault. I truly believe that. The Joker tore him down… and if I'd been through those things then I honestly can't say for sure I'd have acted any differently".

Ramirez listened quietly and patiently, though the talk of Dent had brought up some bad memories that she hadn't allowed herself to face yet.

"If the truth came out then… all those convictions, everything we all fought for would be torn down. So the _Batman_ volunteered to take the blame, to keep Harvey's reputation intact, and to keep hope alive that we can bring Gotham back from the brink".

"Jim", Ramirez protested. "That's bullshit, if you don't mind my saying so. It's hope based on a lie… based on a compromise. And the one thing I've always respected you for is the way you don't ever sacrifice people for a so-called greater good – you always try to save everyone".

Gordon looked down at his feet, ashamed, and Ramirez immediately regretted what she'd said. Who the hell was she to tell him right and wrong, after what she'd done?

"You're right", Gordon said weakly. "I hate this… I hate the whole idea. But I just… _can't_ bring myself to do anything different. At the same time, I don't know if I've got the will to keep this charade up. I mean, who knows how long we'll need to".

"No…" Ramirez interrupted. "I'm sorry, sir. I shouldn't have said that. This is a difficult situation, and I don't envy you being in the position you're in. Whatever you choose to do I'm sure it's what you think is right. That's just who you are".

The two officers stared at each other, and smiled thinly. Both of them had been through hard times recently, and, even though they might not want to admit it, they found comfort in sharing their troubles. After several seconds, Ramirez rose from her chair and walked around the large, wooden desk that separated them. She stopped close to Gordon, who looked up at her. She leant down to him and planted a soft, comforting kiss on his cheek. Though it was brief, Gordon savoured her sweet smell as she got close to him.

And then, as quickly as she had moved close, Anna moved away toward the door. As she reached it she stopped and turned back towards Gordon, but kept her eyes towards the ground. "I can't get his face out of my mind", she said, her voice shaking. "Every time I close my eyes I see him… half handsome and half hideous, but all terrifying. And his coin… his coin just won't stop spinning".

Gordon looked at her sympathetically. "I see him too", he replied. "There's a lot of false blame being thrown around without us throwing it at ourselves, too. And perhaps his coin won't stop spinning until you decide which side it should land on".

Ramirez looked up at him and smiled – the first time since she had entered his office that a smile had been genuine. "Bye, Jim", she said.

"Bye Anna", Gordon replied softly as she walked out of the door.


	3. It was Ramirez 3

Robinson Community Hospital was in a rough part of the city – though, in Gotham, weren't they all? It wasn't as big or as new as Gotham General, which had all of the investment and the publicity, and sometimes it suffered for it – it was seen as somehow _less_. But, as Ramirez climbed out of her tired, worn out car, it may as well have been Heaven.

Her mother was in there, and she was safe. For the first time in a long while, everything seemed like it might be alright – her biggest trial had just passed, and she was still a cop and still free. The guilt was still there, and it gnawed away at the back of her mind, but now she had something to fight back with – _hope_, maybe, or optimism at least.

She passed through the entrance to the hospital and was immediately overwhelmed by the smell of… _c__leanliness_. Compared to the smog that hung over the city just on the other side of the doors, it was refreshing. The woman behind the desk smiled, and directed Anna to the fifth floor where she promised that her mother was being 'cared for'. She walked slowly, but her heart was pounding – she had no idea what state her mother would be in. The last time she had visited her in Gotham General she had been in a coma. What if she'd woken up? What would she tell her?

She hadn't woken up. She was still asleep in the hospital bed. White sheets covered her body, and her eyes were closed – she looked like she was sleeping peacefully. The only sign that anything was wrong was her thinning hair – it had been combed over to hide the patches where chunks had come loose – and her deathly pale skin. The sight of her in that state would have brought Ramirez to tears if it wasn't for the fact that they weren't alone. A young man sat opposite the door, and he stared at her as she entered.

"Alex", Ramirez said. Her voice cracked as she spoke, and she cleared her throat to try and stop it from happening again. The young man gave her the slightest of nods and she took a seat in the empty chair opposite him. "How is she?"

He didn't look at her as he answered. "She's dying", he said. His voice was cold, almost hostile. She was used to it. Alex was her younger brother, and they hadn't been on the best of terms for a long time. "Hasn't opened her eyes since I got here a couple of hours ago. Where have you been?"

Anna glanced up at him. He didn't know what she'd done to help their mother… the sacrifices she'd made. She desperately wanted to tell him, but the words wouldn't come. Instead, she just sighed. She reached out and gently took her mother's hand in hers. As she squeezed it slightly, she silently willed her to wake up.

They'd known a long time ago that this cancer would kill her, eventually, but the knowledge hadn't made it any easier on them. They didn't have much in the way of family, apart from each other, which made their drift apart even harder to bear. When the doctor's had told them that she only had a few months to live… the look in her mother's eyes broke Anna's heart. It had been a look of… relief? Or acceptance, perhaps. She'd resigned herself to her fate almost immediately. It was left to Anna and Alex to try and fight in her place.

Which was hard. Alex was… well, let's just say he wasn't exactly a stand up citizen. Four months out of prison, he worked part time is a pizzeria, when he wasn't dealing drugs. He could barely afford to keep himself alive. Which meant it was left to her to pay for their mother's medical treatment. At first it was fine… her police paycheck wasn't much, but it had been enough. But as the cancer progressed and she needed more and more… the bills just got bigger and bigger, and it wasn't long before she was struggling to pay them.

Things came to a head a month or so ago. She'd missed a payment, and the hospital – or their representatives, or whoever – had threatened to take her to court. Anna had tried to find ways of making more money, but nothing worked – she couldn't get a second job because her work at the MCU was so full-on - she sometimes had to do twelve hour shifts - and she couldn't take out a loan because then she'd just struggle to pay _that_ back. So she did something that she had known she would regret – she checked her mother out of the hospital.

She'd tried to convince herself that she'd be able to care for her at home, but she'd been deluding herself – she was hardly at home these days anyway. To make things worse, her brother had found out… and he was not happy. It wasn't long before he came banging on her door. _One thing_, he'd screamed. _One thing she needs from you is money… and you can't even give her that. You don't care about her. You never did!_

His words had shaken her, but she knew that at least some of what he'd said was true – money was the only thing she could do for her mother now. She'd decided then and there… whatever she had to do, whoever she had to get close to, she would do it. And now, staring down at her mother's peaceful face… even though she'd ruined more than one person's life, even though she had almost been killed… if she had the chance she would do the same again.

"Miss Ramirez?" A soft voice interrupted her. Alex's eyes rose and then quickly lowered again, and Anna turned around. There was a man there – a doctor, she assumed. "I'm sorry to interrupt", he said. "Can I have a word please?"

Anna nodded and followed him out, along the crowded corridor and into an office at the far end. He held the door open for her and closed it gently behind her, before motioning for her to take a seat in one of the empty chairs while he sat in another.

His eyes were wide, and his face wore an expression that made Ramirez nervous – he was uncomfortable, and people usually get uncomfortable when they're about to give bad news.

After a few moments of silence, he sighed. "Look", he said. "There's no easy way of saying this… you missed the last payment, and this isn't the first time that it's happened. Now-"

Anna's face flushed red with anger. "What?" she shouted. "What do you mean it hasn't been paid? I've dealt with all of this… the money should be paid straight to you!"

The doctor coughed, nervously – it was clear that he wasn't used to this kind of situation. "I'm sorry, Miss Ramirez", he said, his voice still calm. "But the last payment was definitely missed. The next is due in two weeks, and if that is not paid promptly then I'm afraid we'll have to take this further".

Ramirez's mind was racing – she'd made a deal with those bastards. She drove Rachel Dawes to where they told her to, and they would pay her mother's medical bills for as long as she needed them to.

The doctor was looking at her while she thought - his narrow eyes peeped over the top of his thick glasses. "Miss Ramirez", he said gently. "Perhaps it's time you started to think about… letting go."

Ramirez's brown wrinkled in a frown. _Letting go?_ she thought. _What does he mean?_ She didn't speak, but her heart started to beat harder in her chest.

"Your mother…" the doctor started. "She's not going to wake up. It might sound harsh, but it's the truth. She's _dying_… and there is nothing you can do, not with all the money and all the medical care in the world. Some things just… can't be stopped". With that, he leant back in his chair, eyes nervous, waiting for her to respond.

Which she did, almost instantly. "Screw you!" she shouted. "I'm not giving up on her, even if everyone else is!" She stood suddenly and strode towards the door.

"Where are you going?" the doctor asked, though he made no move to stop her.

Without looking back, Anna replied: "To fix this". She ripped the door open and slammed it shut behind her.

As she strode along the corridor, mind racing, she didn't hear her brother as he shouted after her.

"Anna?" he called. "What's going on?"

She did not give him an answer.


	4. It was Ramirez 4

Ramirez pulled up outside the club, abandoning her car a few yards from the entrance. She could hear the pounding bass before she even opened her door. She hated places like this – dark and deafening, they were places that people went to when they were trying to become faceless, blending in with the crowd. It was a place to come and hide from life – she could see the attraction, but also felt that it was the cowards way out.

Everyone knew that the mob owned this club. They would sell their drugs and launder their money here, and everyone knew it. But the cops – Anna had stopped thinking of them as 'we' – were too frightened to shut this place down. Even during the height of Gordon and Harvey Dent's war on the mob, this place was left untouched. On any day you could find judges, politicians, even other cops relaxing behind its doors, leaving the stresses of the outside world behind them.

It was dark, and it was raining. Ramirez slammed the door of her car closed, and hunched the collar of her jacket up, trying to hide from the rain drops. The club's neon signs shone out into the night, illuminating the crowds of people lining up outside, desperate to reach the ecstasy that the inside promised. Anna bypassed all of it, heading straight toward the bouncer manning the door. She flashed her badge – something she was grateful that she still possessed – and strode to the doors. As she moved to go through them, a woman opened them from the other side – Ramirez glanced at her as she passed, barely noticing her other than the red lensed glasses that she was wearing.

Inside, the stench of sweat and cigarettes hit her immediately, making her gag – it was barely eight, but this place was already full of swaying bodies. The music was deafening, its monotonous beat pulsed through her body, and bright lights flashed all around her. She shivered involuntarily, and began to make her way towards the back of the club, pushing her way through the cracks between bodies.

Two bouncers flanked the back office, making it plainly obvious that the bosses were in there. If she hadn't been so furious, she might have stopped to think about how to play this. As it was, she didn't even stop to acknowledge the two men, and instead she just flashed her badge once again and passed straight through, ignoring their protests.

The room she passed into was dark, the only light coming from a small lamp in the far corner. Smoke hung in the air, swirling around in the dim glow. There were six men sat around a table, in the middle of a card game – they all turned to face her when she entered, surprised and amused expressions filling their faces. Ramirez felt cold metal press against the back of her head, and heard the _click_ of a gun being cocked even above the music just through the door. One of the bouncers had followed her inside, and was clearly not happy that she was there.

She swallowed nervously, slowly realising that she'd made a big mistake just rushing in without a plan. "I'm here for Maroni", she said, trying to sound calm and confident, while inside she was filling with panic.

Some of the men burst into laughter at this. Ramirez didn't understand why, but she flushed with anger at being laughed at. "What?" she yelled. "Get him out here, now".

One of the men – the only one who hadn't laughed at her – stood. "It's nice to see you, Miss Ramirez", he said smiling. "You don't have a warrant, so can I assume that you're here on a social visit?"

Ramirez eyed him suspiciously – who was this man, and how did he know who she was? She stayed silent, her nervous eyes moving from face to face. _This was a mistake_, she thought to herself.

The man just looked at her, still smiling – it was the smile of a predator about to pounce. "Perhaps we can talk privately, officer", he said. "If you'd follow me to my office".

Anna felt the gun move away from her head, and she allowed herself to look around at the man who had been holding it. He was massive – like a bear that had been wrapped up in a suit. Without taking her eyes off him, she spoke. "I don't understand", she said softly. "Where's Maroni?"

The man moved closer to her and put his hand gently on her back, manoeuvring her back towards the door. "We'll discuss that upstairs", he said. "If you'd just follow me". He led her back out into the crowd, and up to the second floor. The man-mountain of a bouncer followed them, and Ramirez couldn't keep herself from glancing back at him, checking to make sure he wasn't about to shoot her.

They moved into a small office, right above the room that they'd just been in – a room that she'd been in once before. Inside was brightly lit, though there wasn't much to speak of – several chairs, and a large desk behind which the man moved to sit. On the desk was a closed laptop. "Search her", the man said to the bouncer.

Ramirez felt rough hands grab her and move over her body. She thought about struggling – thought about grabbing the gun that was strapped to her side – but thought better of it. The man that was searching her had a gun that she knew about, and she had no doubt that there would be another hidden behind that desk.

The bouncer's hand closed around her gun. He reached under her jacket, pulled it out and placed it on the desk. The man behind it nodded to him and he left, leaving Ramirez alone and unarmed with this mysterious man. He invited her to take a seat opposite him, and, hesitantly, she did so. For the first time she had the chance to look the man over in the clear light; his hair was black, his skin dark. He looked almost South American, though he spoke with a heavy South Gotham accent.

He sat back in his chair, legs crossed and his head resting on his hand. "Now…" he sighed. "What can I do for you, officer?"

Ramirez frowned. "I don't know you", she said. "Where is Maroni?"

The man smiled. "He's dead", he replied. "Killed by the _Batman_… so they say. He killed six people, but left you alive. How does that make you feel?"

Ramirez sighed. "It doesn't", she said, coldly. "So… who are you, exactly? His successor?"

The man smiled. "You know…" he said. "Maroni was a smart man. Cold, calculating… but he knew the value of keeping his word. Of being… not trustworthy, exactly, but someone you knew that if you made a deal with him he would honour it. It was one of his weaknesses. Another was the way he seemed to enjoy putting himself out in the open – he was the head of one of the largest crime families in Gotham, and he made every effort to point it out. Any crime that went down, the cops knew who was responsible and where to find him. It was a stupid way to operate. So yes, I am his successor. But I don't intend to tell you who I am".

Ramirez leaned forward. "You say Maroni was a man of his word", she growled, trying to sound intimidating. "Well that's what I want. I made a deal with him, and I want it honouring".

"You're forgetting…" the man replied quickly. "I am not Maroni, and his promises aren't mine". The man paused, briefly, and sighed. He leaned forward and opened the laptop that was sitting on his desk. "Let me show you something", he said, and after a few moments he turned the laptop around so that Ramirez could see what was on the screen. It took a second or so for her to recognise what she was seeing, and when she did her heart jumped into her mouth.

There, on the screen in front of her, was footage of her sitting in that very same office, two weeks ago, making her deal with Maroni. His gravelly voice suddenly came out of the speakers. "_So, officer_", it said. "_What exactly are you asking?_"

"_I want my mother's hospital bills paid_", her own voice said. "_In return, I'll be your 'man on the inside'… I'll feed you information about what Gordon is doing, and where his next target will be_".

There was a brief pause before Maroni had responded. "_And what makes you think I don't already have a man in the MCU?_ _No… I'm afraid you'll have to give me something more_".

Another pause. "_So… what do you want from me?_" Anna's voice asked.

Ramirez remembered that moment like it was yesterday. She remembered how, when she'd asked that question, Maroni's mouth had twisted into a horrible grin, and he looked her dead in the eyes. He knew then that she was willing to do anything.

"_One day I'll ask you for a favour_", he'd said. "_And when that time comes, no matter what that favour is… you'll do it, without hesitating. If you promise that, then consider those medical bills paid_".

Anna's own voice replied almost straight away, and listening to it now, she felt a pang of guilt at how… _eager_ her voice sounded. So desperate to get that money that she hadn't thought about what she was really promising. "_OK_", she'd said. "_I'll do it_".

The man turned the laptop around again so that Ramirez could no longer see the screen, and he closed it shut. It didn't matter what else had been recorded, Anna knew that if that recording was ever seen then her career – hell, her life – would be over. They had her, and they knew it – they didn't need to pay her bills to get her to do what they wanted.

The smile that had appeared on the man's face made her sick to her stomach. He said something else, but Anna barely heard him – her mind was still reeling from what she'd just seen. She felt a hand grab her by the arm and lift her out of the chair. It led her through the club, towards the exit, and she floated along in a daze. The hand released her just outside, and she stumbled over to her car. She stood there, fumbling with her keys, for several minutes, trying to think of what she could do. Her daze was clearing, being replaced by blind fury. She ripped open her car door, leaned inside and opened her glove box. Inside was another gun – a spare that she always kept there just in case.

_I'll kill him_, she thought. _Kill him and delete that recording. It's my only hope._

She grabbed the gun and stood back up, only to feel another hand grab her by the arm. She reeled around, ready to shoot at whoever it was. But she came face-to-face with the wide eyes of Stephens.

"Anna", he growled. "What the hell are you doing?"

Ramirez was still in a blind fury, and she ripped her arm out of his grasp. "What am _I _doing?" she yelled. "What are _you_ doing, Stephens? Did you think I wouldn't see you tailing me? I'm not an idiot. Now get out of my way!"

She tried to walk past him, but he moved to block her. "Don't be stupid", he said quietly. "Whatever it is that's got you this mad, it can wait. We need to get back to the MCU. Something big is going down. Something _bad_. You need to hear it".

For a moment, Ramirez seriously considered ignoring him and simply walking back into the club and opening fire. But, mercifully, the rational part of her mind took control – if she did that, she'd end up in jail the same as she would if that recording was ever leaked. She took some deep breaths, and slowly she calmed down.

Eventually, she spoke. "OK, Stephens", she sighed. "I'm OK. Let's go".

And with that she climbed slowly into the car and drove away, fully intending to return later to finish what she had started.


	5. It was Ramirez 5

Ramirez clutched the mug of coffee that Stephens had brought her, not for the first time that day. They had reached the MCU – or what remained of it after the Joker's bomb had torn most of it down – just after nine. She'd assumed that they would have been the last to arrive, but she was wrong – Anderson and Lee were missing.

Anna sat at the back, alone. Once Stephens had given her the coffee he had moved away – he seemed uncomfortable around her. She hoped it was only because of the way she'd acted earlier – she'd been ready to punch him if he got in her way – but she worried that it was because he knew more about her than he was letting on. Why _had_ he been tailing her, if not because they were suspicious of her? She decided then to confront Gordon about it.

The room was filled… maybe twenty people, all sat patiently waiting for the Commissioner to arrive. Ramirez had no doubt that some of the people there would already know what he was going to tell them, but she had no interest; in the past her curiosity might have got the better of her, and she might have been desperately moving from person to person, trying to glean whatever information she could from them.

But now she didn't care. She felt nothing. She briefly wondered whether she was losing the ability to care – perhaps a defence mechanism against her life. The only thing she felt now was sorrow for her mother, and anger toward that bastard at the club. Nothing else mattered.

The door to the room opened; all twenty people turned simultaneously towards the sound. Gordon walked in, followed by a woman that Ramirez didn't recognise – she looked Asian, with short black hair tied in a short pony-tail. She wore a black suit, and carried herself with a certain confidence, even arrogance. _She's a_ _Fed_, Ramirez thought instantly.

Gordon moved to the front of the room. His cheeks were red, as though he had just been in an argument, but his eyes were filled with sorrow.

"Good evening, everyone", he said. "I know it's late, and I'm sorry for dragging you all in here, but I have an unhappy announcement to make. About an hour and a half ago, two bodies were found downtown". He paused then. Ramirez felt sorry for him… he had already been through so much in the past couple of days. What else did he have to cope with now?

Gordon took almost a minute to compose himself, and when he did he continued. "The bodies were of Detectives Anderson and Lee. They were murdered".

A noise swept the room then, quickly building from a quiet murmur to full blown shout; they'd already lost two men, and now they had to mourn two more?

"I know it's hard to take, especially now…" Gordon continued. "But we have to try and treat this as we would any other murder. We do our jobs, and we do it professionally".

Anna saw a hand rise slowly and hesitantly towards the front of the crowd. It was one of the younger detectives – Daniels, she thought his name was. Gordon nodded towards him, and he spoke nervously. "But…" he said hesitantly. "The MCU doesn't normally deal with homicides, unless they're part of a bigger investigation…" His voice trailed off, but the sharper ones among them already knew where he was going.

Gordon knew, but he wanted the question asked openly, so that there would be no doubt. "What's your point, Daniels?" he asked softly.

"Well, sir", Daniels responded, glancing around at the other cops sat around him. "My point is… we're chasing the Batman, right? Do we think that he murdered Anderson and Lee?"

Ramirez watched Gordon's face as it cringed. She knew that he would say 'Yes'… and she knew that he hated himself for it. It wasn't in his nature to lie, especially when he knew how much it affected the people around him. His eyes lowered as he spoke. "At this point there's no reason to think otherwise", he said, and another murmur swept the room. "But that doesn't mean any of you can rule out other suspects. We need evidence".

There was a cough from the side of the room; it came from the woman in the suit. Ramirez hated her already. She looked at Gordon like she'd just scraped him off her shoe, so god knows what she thought of the rest of them. Gordon looked at her, briefly, and then back at the crowd.

"And on that note, I think it's time I introduced our guest, Agent Rudra" he said, and motioned toward the woman. "She's a _Fed_, assigned to the Batman case. It seems he's been classified as a terrorist".

Rudra moved forward, in front of Gordon. Rather than protest, Gordon walked slowly around her and took a seat in the front row, beside Daniels.

"Thank you, Commissioner Gordon", Rudra said. "And may I say how excited I am to be working with such a professional team. As the Commissioner says, the Batman has recently been designated a terrorist – particularly after his exploits in Hong Kong – and that puts it under the FBI's jurisdiction. Now, I don't want to ruffle any feathers here, so the Bureau is allowing me to work alongside you rather than having us walk in and take over.

"So… let's get started". She walked over to the far wall which had been made into a makeshift evidence board. On it she stuck several pictures – most were of Batman, in the few photographs people had been able to take. The ones that caught Ramirez's – and the rest of the room's – eye were of the murder victims. Anderson, from the look of it, had been shot through the head, while Lee's throat had been cut. Seeing those pictures made Ramirez feel queasy.

"While we cannot say for sure that these two most recent deaths are linked to Batman, we can't rule it out either", Rudra said as she finished hanging the last photo up. "As a result, we'll be splitting into two teams. The main team will focus on finding and arresting Batman, as he is our main suspect for these murders, along with the six that we know he committed.

"The second team will focus on the murders of detectives Anderson and Lee specifically, trying to establish for a fact whether or not Batman was responsible. This team will be smaller – perhaps two or three people – and will feed their findings back to the main team. Does everyone understand?"

There were grumbles that they did. They wanted to find and punish whoever did this – of that Ramirez had no doubt – but they were tired, and they were miserable. Many of them had barely got any sleep in the last couple of weeks, with everything that had happened to the city. And Anna in particular… she wanted no part of this. All she wanted was to get back to her mother, to find some way of making the money that they needed.

Rudra spoke again. "I'll leave the job of figuring out the members of each team to the Commissioner – he knows your strengths and weaknesses better than I do". She smiled – a hollow, meaningless smile; just an attempt to put them at ease, to make them feel like she was one of them. Anna knew that none of the others would accept her there – she wasn't Gordon, so she had no business taking over. "And one more thing before I leave..." she said, casually. "As part of my own investigation into the Batman case, I will be interviewing several people - including some members of the MCU. Please... don't take it personally if I act to speak to you. I'm just trying to build up a proper picture of the last few weeks". With that, she nodded to Gordon and left.

Gordon stood slowly. "Thank you, Agent Rudra", he said. "We'll disperse for now. The crime scenes have been swept by forensics, so there's nothing for us to do tonight. We'll decide on the teams in the morning". He paused then and looked at his feet, nervous about something. After a while, he looked back up at them. "Listen", he sighed. "Someone is out there killing cops. We can't be sure who or why, so everyone… just be careful, OK? We've suffered enough these past few weeks. Dismissed".

The group slowly got to their collective feet and left, one-by-one. Ramirez hung back, wanting… no, _needing_ to speak to Gordon. Soon, there was only her, Gordon and Stephens left.

"Jim", she said softly. "I need to talk to you".

Gordon nodded. "Yes", he replied. "I thought you might. I know what you're going to say, Anna, and I'm sorry. There are things going on here that I need your help with".

Anna frowned. "What do you mean?" she asked, her voice nervous.

Gordon glanced at Stephens, who moved to the doors and checked to make sure they were alone. When he had confirmed it, Gordon turned back to Ramirez. "Other than the people in this room, the only ones who knew the truth about Harvey Dent were Anderson and Lee. It could be why they were targeted, which not only makes you, me and Stephens potential targets, it also makes us the only people who can investigate this murder with a clear head. I've spent time with this _Rudra_ woman, and I guarantee that she's looking for any excuse to try and blame the Batman for this. All she seems to care about is bringing him down".

Anna sighed. If what Gordon was telling her was true – and she had no reason to doubt it – then he was right; it was in her best interests to help find whoever was doing this. She nodded, reluctantly.

Gordon put his hand gently on her shoulder. "Go get some sleep, Anna", he said. "Go see your mother in the morning. Meet Stephens at Anderson's home tomorrow afternoon, see if you can find anything there".

Ramirez looked him in the eyes; his concern seemed genuine, and she was grateful that he was giving her time to see her mother, but she was still worried about why he'd asked Stephens to tail her. Did he know her secret? Had he always known?

She realised that her best course of action was to wait until he was ready to tell her one way or the other; if he wasn't going to let it change anything, then neither would she. She smiled weakly and left, looking forward to a night's sleep.


	6. It was Ramirez 6

_What am I doing here?_

Ramirez stood silently in the corner of Anderson's apartment, barely able to concentrate on what she was doing. She'd sat with her mother all morning, talking to her non-stop as though she could hear a word she was saying. It was funny, she thought; before her mother had gotten sick they barely spoke, other than the occasional phone call or family dinner. Now all she wanted to do was hear her voice again… to know what she was thinking, for her to ask about her day. She missed the simple things that she'd taken for granted before.

That was the day that she'd finally admitted to herself that she would never hear her mother's voice again. When she'd reached her mother's room at the hospital, her brother was already there. They'd shared a brief glance, said their hello's… and that was it. He left ten minutes after she arrived, not uttering another word. She'd wanted to call him back, to ask him to sit with her… she didn't want to be alone…

But she didn't. Instead she barely gave him a glance as he walked past her. Was she too proud to admit that she needed help, even to herself?

Her mother's skin was cold and clammy. Her condition was worsening – she didn't need the doctor to realise that. She tried to tell herself that there was nothing that anyone could have done that would have made a difference, but a part of her mind – a dark, hateful part – kept reminding her that she'd taken her mother out of hospital for a week. She'd taken her mother away from the only people who could have helped her, and all because she was worried about _money_. That it was _her_ fault that her mother was slipping away.

And that voice had gotten louder and louder, until now, just a few hours later, it was all she could hear. _Your fault. Your fault. Your fault_.

Her guilt was so all-consuming that she had barely registered the room that she was in.

"Anna", a voice said, startling her out of her thoughts. It was Stephens. "Have you heard a word I've said?"

Ramirez coughed. She hadn't, but she didn't want to admit it. Instead, she moved away from the wall that she had been leaning against and looked around the room for the first time. She was amazed at how… _familiar_ it looked. There were no paintings, no decorations. The bed was untouched, the chairs showed no signs of use… it looked like Anderson barely spent any time here. It looked exactly like Anna's own home.

_The life of a cop_, she thought bitterly. _Why do we do it? We let the job consume our lives… take us away from the people we love. And for what? So that we can end up murdered in our own homes? Finish up __as nothing more than a stain on the carpet?_

The chalk outline of Anderson's body was in the centre of the floor… it was the only sign that anyone had lived here. She stared down at it, and at the red blood stain that had soaked into the carpet around where his neck had landed.

His throat had been slit.

"Looks like there was a struggle", Stephens's gruff voice said somewhere off to her side. "This table's knocked over, the clock's been knocked off the wall".

Ramirez thought for a moment, trying to picture the scene in her head. It didn't fit. Anderson's throat had been slit in one clean cut, which meant that it had to have been done by surprise… otherwise Anderson would have tried to grab his killer's hand, making the cut more disjointed.

She sighed. "He must have been thrashing around after his throat had been cut", she said. "Struggling to breathe, losing blood fast… but still fighting desperately against whoever did this to him, trying to fight them off". She shivered involuntarily.

In her mind's eye she watched it happen. Anderson… sat peacefully in his chair; maybe watching TV, or reading something. Then a figure emerges from the shadows behind him, silently moving closer and closer. Finally, when they are close enough to touch, the killer moves his hand forward, clutching a small knife. He grabs Anderson's head violently, and at the same instant brings his knife across his throat… the killing strike.

Anderson starts to thrash his arms; partly in a futile attempt to fight off his attacker, but mostly just in shock at the sudden pain he feels. Ramirez wondered how long it took his mind to realise what was happening to him… did he know that he was already dead? Or did he keep fighting to stay alive until the life drained away completely.

She watched him stumble around his apartment –bashing into his coffee table, knocking it on its side. His thrashing arms sweeping across the shelf that hung over his TV, knocking his clock to the ground where it smashed. His body bashing against the door of his apartment, desperately trying to escape… only leaving behind a streak of blood that dripped down the door and into the carpet. And finally… she watched as he collapsed to the ground, the life leaving him completely, lying on his side struggling to keep breathing.

Ramirez wondered then what Anderson's attacker did while he was dying… did they take the opportunity to make their escape? Perhaps sliding out of the window as quietly as they had entered. Anderson's struggling must have made a lot of noise… did his attacker worry that someone would burst in on them, disturbed by the noise?

But something told her that the attacker didn't escape… not right away, at least. This was a skilled kill… an _assassination_, even. The killer would have stayed until Anderson had died. Perhaps they watched, admiring their work... smiling while an innocent man struggled to stay alive, knowing that he was already dead.

Anger flared up inside her, then; a surprising feeling, given that just the night before she had worried that she was becoming dead inside. She knelt beside the chalk outline of where Anderson's body had fallen, and touched the ground where his blood had stained it.

_This is wrong_, she thought to herself. _I shouldn't have to be here. I shouldn't have to care. My mother is all I should care about… and getting the money to help her. Why did Gordon have to choose me for this?_

Stephens touched her gently on the shoulder then, startling her. He smiled weakly when she jumped. She glanced up at him, taking a brief moment to compose herself. Then she stood, slowly.

"No sign of forced entry", Stephens said, grimly. "No footprints… no traces. The forensics boys couldn't find a single print, other than Anderson's. It's like his killer was never here… and it's the same story at Lee's place".

Something had caught Ramirez's eye, though, and she was only half listening to what Stephens was saying. "How was Lee murdered?" she asked, distantly, as she walked slowly across the room.

Stephens watched her as she moved, wondering what it was that she had seen. "Throat cut", he answered. "Same as here – one clean cut across his throat. What have you seen, Anna?" He moved after her, watching as she knelt down beside Anderson's couch.

Ramirez had seen something… something that she had missed the first time she had looked. It was a tiny piece of… glass? Or plastic? It was red… almost the same colour as the carpet, and buried deep inside it. She took out a plastic evidence bag, and a pair of tweezers that Gordon had insisted she take along. Carefully, she lifted the piece off the ground. She held it up, letting Stephens take a look at it, before dropping it into the bag and sealing it in.

"What do you think it is?" Stephens asked. "You think it's something?"

Ramirez sighed. "It's not nothing", she answered. "But I don't know what it is".

Which was _half_ true. Her mind was already racing… taking her back to the night before, at the club. Her mind had been in a daze when she'd got there, but she vaguely remembered bumping into a _woman_ at the door… a woman who had been wearing red lensed glasses. It was a long shot, but it was something at least. If the analysis came back showing that what she'd found was part of a lens, then, she decided, she would head back to the club with a warrant… and, she hoped, take care of two problems at once.

She took one last look around Anderson's apartment. Despite herself – despite knowing that her mother was lying in a hospital bed, dying slowly – she realised that she _did_ care about the here and now. Two of her colleagues had been murdered, and if Gordon was right about their connection… that they were killed because they knew the truth about Harvey Dent… then she could be the next target.

_I'll find you_, she thought. _I'll find you and I'll punish you. _


	7. It was Ramirez 7

After Ramirez and Stephens had dropped the evidence they'd found back at the MCU, Ramirez headed straight to the hospital to see her mother. By the time she arrived it was close to midnight, and the corridors were eerily quiet. The lady at the reception desk told her that visiting hours were over, but after some gentle persuasion she had allowed Anna to go in anyway.

She could see people in their beds, sleeping – mostly peacefully. The quiet was… disconcerting at first, but after a while it became almost comforting. If everything was quiet, she reasoned, then it meant that nothing bad was happening to anyone. Anna tip-toed along the corridor, afraid that her heavy feet might disturb the calm.

Forensics had said that they'd try to get the analysis on the red piece of plastic she'd found done as soon as they could, but she knew that it would be at least the afternoon before they could give them any results. That meant that, tomorrow morning, she and Stephens would be heading over to the second crime scene – Lee's house, out on the edge of the city – to look it over. It gave her about eight hours… eight hours to be with her mother.

When she reached her mother's room she was relieved that – apart from the still unconscious figure of her mother and a nurse quietly tending to her – it was empty. _Good_, she thought. _I don't __think I could deal with Alex tonight_. Her mother still slept peacefully, but Anna was sure that she could see the life being drained away from her. She hated feeling so _powerless_. She'd done so much… betrayed people she'd thought of as friends, destroyed lives. But it had made no difference. Her mother was dying.

The nurse spent some time with them – changing her mother's sheets, making sure she was comfortable. Anna sat in silence, waiting for her to leave. It had been a while since she'd sat with her mother alone – there had always been her brother, or doctors, or her mother's friends. She needed to say things… things that she hadn't said to anyone. Secrets that she needed to tell.

It was selfish, she knew, and cowardly; telling her secrets to someone who she knew – deep in her heart – would never wake up… but she couldn't find the courage to tell anyone else.

After what seemed an age, the nurse left, giving Anna a sympathetic look as she walked past. Now they were alone, with only the steady beep of the life-support equipment keeping them company. She leant forward and gently took her mother's hand, squeezing it slightly.

"Mom", she said, softly. "Mom, I'm so sorry… I said I'd help make you better, but I haven't". Her eyes began to wet, and the first tears started to run slowly down her cheek.

"I don't know what else to do", she continued. "Every time I try to make things better I just end up hurting someone I care about. Like you. Like Alex… _Jim_. And I don't think I can take it anymore. My head just feels… like it's going to explode.

She wiped the tears from her face, and sniffed loudly. Then she looked around, making sure that they were alone in the room. "I need to tell you something", she said. "It's something that I haven't told anyone else. Hell, I probably wouldn't be telling you if you weren't…" Her voice caught in her throat. _If you weren't dying…_

Ramirez laughed bitterly. "What does that make me?_" s_he continued. "A coward? Or something worse? I don't know what's happening to me. It's like… when you first got ill, and I had to face the possibility that you were going to die, I was filled with all these different feelings – fear, sadness, anger… But now I'm just numb inside. And you know _why_? It's because back then I still had hope. I still had _faith_… in life, in people. That's what drove me to do things that I wouldn't normally do – I had faith that the people I trusted would be able to deal with whatever came their way.

"But since you… went to sleep… a lot of horrible things have happened. Things that proved me wrong. _Harvey Dent_ is dead, mom! They guy everyone thought was going to save this city single-handedly. And not just that… he was _broken_ before the end. Everything that he was was torn away, and it happened so… easily. It's frightening, how quickly a person – even someone as seemingly incorruptible as him – can be brought down to the level of a common thug.

"And that's not all. _Batman_ has been torn down as well – Harvey Dent did horrible things, but Batman is taking the blame. I mean… I understand why it's happening, but that doesn't make it any easier to swallow. And Jim… _Commissioner Gordon_ – my boss, remember? – he's the one who has to deal with all of it. And pretty soon, I'm sure, he'll be broken too… like Harvey, like the Bat.

She paused then, working her courage up to say the things that she had been avoiding. She steeled herself – she didn't really believe that her mother could hear anything that she said, but saying her secrets out loud frightened her, even when there was no one to hear them.

"It's my fault", she said. As the words passed her lips, she felt a wave of… not relief exactly, but relaxation – the words were out there now, she couldn't unsay them, and the world hadn't ended. "I made a deal with the devil, and my friends are paying the price.

"I don't know where to start, mom… I couldn't give you anything – I didn't give you the love that you deserved when you were with me… All I could do was get you the best treatment. But the bills were… too much. I just couldn't afford it after a few months. But I couldn't face up to it – I couldn't admit to Alex or Uncle John that the one thing I'd promised you I couldn't give. So I… discharged you from the hospital. And I didn't tell anyone about it. I was going to keep you hidden away at home until… until I could figure something out.

"But then things started to go wrong… This… _monster_ showed up. Out of _nowhere_. The city just went into chaos – everyone became terrified of their own shadow. And as time went on, things just got worse and worse. And the mob started to pay a lot more attention to the MCU, and Harvey Dent, and Batman. And they paid a lot more attention to me.

"No… that's not true. They didn't care about me. I was the one who went to them, not the other way around. This was _my_ fault. I think I can finally own up to it, at least to myself.

"I needed money, for your medical bills. I mean… it's not your fault… I didn't have to go to them. There were other options, I guess, but none that I could see at the time. So I went to the mob, and I promised them whatever they wanted".

In the days after she would think back to this moment and wonder… did she hear the beeping? Did she realise, subconsciously, what was happening? She knew that her only reaction at first was to try and get the words out as quick as she could.

"I sold out Harvey Dent and one of his colleagues, Rachel Dawes. I handed them right over to the mob, knowing what they were going to do. I killed them… I may as well have tied them down and planted the bombs myself. And I don't know how long I can go on living with it".

As the door to the room burst open, and the doctors and nurses rushed in, Ramirez consciously noticed the beeping noise for the first time. It was her mother's life-support machine. She was dying.

She watched, helpless, as they struggled to try and get her heart beating again. They tried for minutes – long, agonising minutes – but her mother did not respond. As she was watching them, a terrible kind of calm passed over her – she had finally accepted what was going to happen, and she had finally come to terms with the idea that she could do nothing to stop it.

As the beeping morphed into one continuous tone, she knew that her mother had died. The doctors looked at her, pity in their faces, comforting words flowing from her lips. She didn't see any of it. She stared at her mother's lifeless body long after the others left the room.

After... what? An hour? Two? She slowly moved towards the bed, and put her hand gently on her mother's.

"Goodbye", she whispered, before wiping away her tears.

She left the hospital, knowing what she needed to do. She needed to make things right.


	8. It was Ramirez 8

Anna sat in her car, hands gripping the wheel tightly. She had driven straight to the MCU building from the hospital. Being alone in her car, with just her own thoughts for company, had really driven the reality of the past few hours home. Her mother was _dead._ There was nothing she could do to bring her back. The tears had started flowing a long time ago, and they showed no signs of stopping, however much she willed them to.

Her determination to set things right had brought her straight to the MCU, but she was damned if she was going to let any of them see her in this state. So she just… sat, and cried, staring out at the devastation that had been caused by the Joker's bombing. The Major Crimes Unit building was surrounded by… rubble, and workmen who were trying in vain to clear it. The entire Eastern side of the building had collapsed… and reports put the number of dead at around twenty. Twenty of her colleague had died just in this one explosion… and now more were being _murdered_ in their own homes.

She gritted her teeth and pushed open her car door. Slowly, she made her way up the stairs at the font of the building and through the front door. Inside there was chaos. Cops were running backwards and forwards, most of them screaming down telephones or at each other. Something big had happened… something _else_. Ramirez grabbed the nearest person and asked them what was happening.

"Someone killed Stephens", they shouted above the noise. "And made an attempt on Gordon's life".

This news shook Ramirez to the core. Stephens was _dead_? It seemed like only a minute ago that she'd been searching Anderson's apartment with him… and now he was dead? It didn't make sense.

"Wait…" she said, refusing to believe it. "What do you mean, dead? How?"

She held on tightly to the man's collar. He was a rookie, she knew, and he wouldn't know how to handle all of this. But she couldn't keep the anger out of her face, and she felt a pang of guilt when she saw his eyes widen in fear.

"He… he was murdered", the boy stammered. "Throat cut, just like Anderson and Lee. I'm… sorry… I thought everyone knew".

Ramirez slowly released her grip on the boy's collar, and he snuck away quickly. _I have to tell Gordon_, she thought. _I have to tell him everything. About the mob, about the woman with the red glasses. I can't handle all of __this guilt__._

Ramirez pushed her way through the crowd of people towards the back of the room, where Gordon's office was located. The evidence room was filled with people, and papers were strewn across the tables. There was a new found determination to find the killer now, though there were more and more people who were baying for the Batman's blood… Stephens had been well like, as though he were the connection between the Commissioner's political wrangling and their own efforts on the streets. And Ramirez… she always liked the way Stephens judged her all the time. Any tiny mistake and he would pick her up on it, but he wouldn't tell anyone else as long as he thought that Anna had gotten the message. In this MCU, mistakes could cost people their lives.

Gordon's door was closed, unusually. He usually insisted on keeping in the thick of things, always casting his analytical eye over everything that passed through. She stopped just in front of it. _This is it_, she thought. _This is where my life ends…_

She took a deep breath, and knocked heavily on the door.

To her surprise, a woman's voice answered. "Come in", it said. Confused, Ramirez grabbed the door handle and twisted it, pushing open the door as she did so. Inside, sat at Gordon's desk, was Agent Rudra, the FBI agent sent to assist with the Batman case.

"Lieutenant Ramirez", she said with a smile. "Come in, come in".

Ramirez slowly tip toed into the room, looking around as she did so. The room still looked the same, with files thrown around the edges of the rooms, and overstuffed cabinets. There were all kinds of pictures and articles and pieces of evidence stuck up on the walls. The only thing that was different to the last time she had been there was the window. Gordon usually had the blinds closed, leaving the light on his desk to cast its ominous glow about the room, giving it an almost mysterious feel. Now, though, the blinds were open and the sunlight shone in, lighting up the room. Now Anna could see it for what it was… a tiny, messy room… a sign of their Commissioner's obsession with his work.

Ramirez's eyes fell on Rudra then, who motioned for her to sit in the empty chair. Rudra was an interesting looking woman… dark skin, she looked as though she came from India… or maybe Pakistan. But he voice showed no sign of an Asian accent. Instead, she spoke with the tone of a well-educated American… no Gotham accent. She wore a black suit (with trousers, not a skirt) and glasses.

Ramirez's initial reaction when she had first seen Rudra the day before was that she was stuck up… that she looked down on the regular cops like Anna, thinking herself better than them. And now that she saw her up close for the first time, she was sure that she was right. She never looked right at Anna, as though she didn't think she was good enough for eye contact. It was fair to say that Anna hated her already.

Anna sniffed loudly. "Where's Jim?" she asked.

Rudra smiled. "_Commissioner Gordon_ is currently in a secure location, and he will remain there until we are satisfied that the threat to his life can be neutralised" Rudra answered.

Anna frowned. "Who's we?" she asked. "I thought you were just here to _observe and advise_".

"I was". Rudra leaned back in Gordon's chair and lifted her feet up, resting them on top of Gordon's desk. "But things have become a lot more complicated. Gordon is no longer here to take charge, and Stephens, his _second in command_, has been murdered. So I have taken over this investigation, and I have shifted our focus so that all of our resources are now being used to find out the location of the Batman. I don't think there's any doubt that he is the culprit. Who else could have done this without being seen?"

_Idiot_, Ramirez thought. "That's a mistake", she said out loud.

Rudra smiled again, lowered her feet back to the ground, and leant forward on Gordon's desk, leaning her elbows on the top. "And why do you say that, Lieutenant?" she asked, her voice amused. "Do you know something I don't?"

Anna was getting pissed off, and she didn't have time to play games anymore. She leaned forward herself, so that her head was inches from Rudra's. "There are a hell of a lot of things that I know that you don't", she growled. "And if I can't speak to Gordon, then there's no reason for me to stick around". She moved to stand up and storm out, planning to head down to forensics and then to confront the mob, but Rudra stopped her.

"Sit down, Lieutenant", she said firmly. Anna made no move to do so. "That was not a request".

Reluctantly, Anna sat back down, her arms folded across her chest.

"Now", Rudra continued, her voice now softer. "We need to talk. As far as we can tell, you were the last person to see Stephens alive…"

"Apart from his killer, you mean", Ramirez interrupted.

Rudra smiled thinly. "Of course", she sighed. "Apart from his killer". Anna knew everything she needed to now. This _bitch_ was starting to suspect her of murdering her colleagues. But why? What evidence did she have that caused her to think that she would do this?

"So… tell me what happened the last time you saw him", Rudra said before leaning back in her chair.

Ramirez paused. She was being interrogated, she knew, and she would have to be very careful about what she said. Of course she wasn't guilty of murder, but she was guilty of other things… things that could get her in just as much trouble. "We…" she started, and then paused. "We looked around Anderson's apartment together. Then we drove back to the MCU building, him leading in his car and me following behind. I didn't come inside… we said our goodbyes and I watched him come in here, and then I got back into my car and drove to the hospital. He seemed fine when I left him".

"The hospital?" Rudra enquired.

"Yeah…" Anna sighed. "I went to see my mother. A bunch of doctors and nurses can probably verify that I've been there since I left Stephens outside this building. And I was at the hospital when Anderson and Lee were murdered as well, in case you were wondering…"

There was a slight pause, before Rudra pulled another one of her fake smiles. "Anna", she said, and Ramirez realised that she would now try her best to be friendly. "I don't suspect you of anything. I just needed to know what state of mind he was in, that's all".

"Bullshit", Ramirez responded, before her mind could stop the word from coming out. "You're doing your best to ruffle feathers, aren't you? I'm guessing I'm not the only one you've had sat in here while you accuse them of murdering their colleagues. You're a _bitch_, Agent Rudra".

The smile quickly fell from Rudra's face… Ramirez was quietly pleased that she had managed to touch a nerve. "Fine, Ramirez", Rudra growled. "But _something_ is going on around here, and I think _you_, and _Gordon_ and _Stephens_ were in on it together. Why did he pick _you_ for his 'special investigation' into these murders? Why not one of a dozen other people?"

Ramirez stood. "Because I worked homicide, asshole", she said loudly. "Meaning I investigated a lot of murders. I'm good at what I do, and so is… _was _Stephens. So fuck you, ma'am". Then she stormed out of the room, slamming the door behind her.

_I guess I can't rely on the MCU to back me up anymore_, she thought as she left, a wry smile spreading across her lips. _Oh well… guess I'll have to do this on my own_.

And she knew exactly where she was going next.


	9. It was Ramirez 9

"Lieutenant Ramirez… don't see you down here that often. What's the occasion?"

The forensics section of the MCU had been left largely undamaged in the recent explosion, save for a bunch of old evidence that had been kept in cold storage being destroyed. It was there that Ramirez had headed after her run in with Agent Rudra, and she had been left with a bad taste in her mouth.

The main lab for their forensic work was small, maybe ten feet square, but it was cram packed with equipment. The lights were luminescent, and gave everything an eerie white glow. Towards the back a door led to the storage area, where old samples were kept refrigerated.

"No occasion, Jack", Ramirez replied. "Just here on business". Ramirez walked through the room towards Jack, looking around at the various pieces of equipment that lined the sides of the room. "How come you're down here on your own? Where's the rest of your team?"

Jack laughed and turned back to the microscope he had been looking through when Ramirez had entered. "My 'team' got the day off… all three of them", he said bitterly. "Honestly, I don't know how they expect me to get the results they want when they give me such a small set of resources to work with".

Ramirez sighed and leant against one of the tables. Every time she saw Jack he seemed to be complaining about something. She liked him, but she wished he'd just lay off every once in a while. "Just gotta deal with it best you can, huh?" she said absently. "I came here for the analysis results of the sample that Stephens dropped off a few hours ago. I know it hasn't been long, but have you got anything yet?"

Jack glanced at her and then pushed himself away from the desk that he was working at, sending his wheeled chair spinning across the room towards a cabinet. He pulled open one of the drawers and pulled out a file, before wheeling himself back to Ramirez.

"Heard about Stephens", he said, laying the file down and opening it. "Nasty business. I know you were pretty close. You wanna talk about it?"

_Christ_, Ramirez thought. _Won't he ever give it up?_ The reason that she hadn't been down here very often in the past few months was because her and Jack used to be… an _item_. It had lasted a long time, and Ramirez used to think that he was the one… but they drifted apart when her mother got sick. Her obsession with providing her with the best, and most expensive, treatment hadn't sat well with him, especially when she had asked him to help out with the medical bills. He had refused, and their relationship had ended soon after. She regretted it now, of course… just one item on a long list of things that she regretted… but she didn't want to even try to go back to the way things used to be. He, on the other hand, never seemed to shut up about it. Every time she had seen him since then he'd made some kind of suggestion that they should get together, and Anna was getting tired of having to blow him off.

"No, thanks", she answered. "Just want the info, if you've got it".

Jack gave her a sad look, but he didn't push it any further. "Yeah…" he sighed. "I've got your info. The fragment Stephens brought in is a piece of plastic, most likely from a lens of some sort. Glasses, maybe".

_Glasses_, Anna thought, once again seeing an image in her mind of the woman she had run into outside the mob club. _Son of a bitch…_

She forced herself to smile at Jack, and thanked him. Before she got to the door, Jack stopped her.

"How's your mother?" he asked.

Anna paused for a moment, before turning back to face him. "Dead", she sighed, and then she left.

* * *

It was past midnight when Anna's car pulled up outside the mob club. There were dozens of people lined up outside in the rain, waiting to get in. The same monotonous beat that echoed out into the streets the last time she was here was present, and she could feel it vibrating her car as she sat, planning her next move.

The last time she had come here she had been overcome with rage, bursting through the door without thinking and almost getting herself killed. This time, she was determined, she would enter with a clear plan of what her intentions were.

_But what are my intentions?_ she thought, absently cradling her gun in her hands. _Am I going in there to end this? Or am I going in there for confirmation of what I suspect? I could be wrong… there could be no connection between the mob and the cop-killings. Am I just desperately looking for any excuse to get back into that room? Trying to give myself an opportunity to snatch that laptop?_

She shook her head, vigorously. This was no time for self-doubt. She would march in there, and she would act like the nice polite police woman. She needed them to confirm it before she went any further.

She pushed open the door to her car, and stepped out into the rain. After a moment or contemplation, she took her gun out of its holster and slipped it into the glove compartment. If she didn't have it with her, she reasoned, then there was less chance of her doing something stupid with it.

Approaching the bouncer, she remembered the way she had brushed past him the last time she had come here. The memory made her smile, thinly. This time, she knew, she would have to do it by the book.

She approached him and flashed her badge. "Lieutenant Ramirez", she said, curtly. "I'd like a word with the owner of this establishment".

The man grunted, but he reluctantly stepped to the side. As Ramirez walked past him and into the club she could hear him as he spoke into his radio, warning the people inside that she was coming. The dance floor looked exactly the same as last time… the same sweating bodies, the same pounding music. _God_, she thought, _how can these people stand doing this every night? Don't they get tired of it?_

One good thing that came out of her last visit was that she knew where the boss of this place worked, and she made her way up the stairs and towards his office. A metal, spiral staircase led to a thin walkway which overlooked the dance floor below. Through the flashing neon lights, Anna could make out a large figure standing outside the door. It was the same man who had held a gun to her head the last time she had been here. Anna hated to admit it, even to herself, but she was a little afraid of him… he was tall, and built like a house, and as she walked closer to him her looked at her as though he would attack at any moment.

But he didn't. Instead, he simply knocked loudly on the door behind him and then pushed the door slowly open.

Inside, the mysterious owner of this club sat behind his desk. When he saw that the cop that he had been warned about was Ramirez, he grinned widely. "Officer!" he yelled, his voice friendly and jovial. Ramirez hated the way he treated her as though she couldn't touch him, and she would make him sorry that he did. "What can I do for you today? More talk about money problems?"

Ramirez smiled and shook her head. "Not today", she said, trying to sound confident. "Today I'm here on official police business. Do you mind if I ask you a few questions?"

The man's smile flickered slightly… so slight that Anna wouldn't have noticed it if she hadn't been looking for it. He nodded and motioned for her to sit down in the empty chair, which she did. "Ask away, Lieutenant", he said.

Ramirez pulled out her notebook, and prepared to make notes. She knew that she wouldn't need them, but it always helped if the person you were interviewing thought that everything they said would be taken down. "Last night…" she started. "There was a woman here. A woman with red glasses. Do you know her?"

Another flicker, this time his eyes. Ramirez had interviewed countless people, and witnessed more, and the one thing she knew was that if someone's eyes moved like that, then the next thing they said would be an outright lie. "Red glasses…" he said, appearing to mull over her question. "Red glasses… No, sorry, can't say that I do".

_Liar_, she thought, and she smiled. "Were you aware that someone has been murdering members of the Major Crimes Unit?" she asked. "That's what I'm investigating. So I'd appreciate it if you cut the bullshit".

Anger flashed across his face, and he leaned forward suddenly, his elbows slamming against the desk. "Fuck you!" he shouted, startling Ramirez. "You come down here and call me a liar? Fine… I know who you're talking about, and I know who she is and where she is. But I ain't gonna tell you shit. And you know what you're gonna do about it?"

Anna smiled. "Please", she said. "Enlighten me".

The man grinned. "You ain't gonna do jack shit. You're in my _pocket_, you hear? I _own_ you. You don't tell me what to do, I tell you what to do. So why don't you run off back home instead of acting like you're still a cop".

Anna was frightened, but she was also angry. How dare this piece of crap talk to her like this? She leaned forward so that her face was close to his, and then she lowered her voice to a whisper. "If anyone else finds out that you had something to do with the death of Rachel Dawes and Harvey Dent, then you'll be in a shit load more trouble than me. And if I _do_ ever go down, I'll make damn sure I take you with me. Understand?"

Then she stood, and moved to leave. Before she got through the door, however, the man called after her. "I didn't have nothing to do with Harvey Dent, Officer", he yelled. "And as for Rachel? As I recall, it was you who knocked her out and dragged her to us. And that makes you an accessory to murder".

Anna carried on walking away, with her back to him. If he could see her face, however, he would have been surprised to see that she was smiling. _So you were there, were you?_ she thought as she left. _Now I know who you are, you son of a bitch. And believe me, Ramon… I'll make sure you get what's coming to you._


	10. It was Ramirez 10

Anna Ramirez was _angry_, but she wasn't stupid. Not anymore. Her run in with the owner of the mob club, or Ramon, as she now knew him to be, had only served to strengthen her resolve. Now she didn't just want to make things right, she wanted _revenge_…

Memories came flooding back… memories that she had not allowed herself to see. Of picking Rachel Dawes up from her apartment, of playing on her desperate need to be reunited with the man that she loved. It sickened her now just how easily the lies had slipped from her lips, and how little guilt there had been until now.

But even then… when she had been consumed by her insane desire for money… she had hesitated.

Ramirez had delivered Rachel into the hands of three men, who had been sent by Maroni. Two of these men were just your everyday _hired thugs… _barely half a brain cell between them. But the third had been something else. He had worn a black mask rather than a balaclava, which was so tight that it traced the outline of his skull, and a dinner suit… and only his _eyes _were visible. They were a deep blue, and they revealed a vicious intelligence underneath that mask. His name had been _Ramon_, which she had found out courtesy of a slip of the tongue from one of his colleagues. It seemed that this man had since gone on to bigger and better things…

They had taken Rachel to a warehouse on the outskirts of the city… _Four-fifty fifty-second street_… At the time, Anna kept telling herself that they wouldn't hurt her, that they'd promised her they wouldn't, and that Rachel was only going to be used as _bait…_ but deep down she had always known better. And her suspicions were confirmed when they tied her down, and surrounded her with barrels of oil… linked to an explosive device.

Anna had hesitated when she saw the truth of what they were about to do, and one of _Ramon's _friends had pointed a gun at her head.

"_Allow me to make it easier on you"_ Ramon had said_. "If you don't leave right now, my colleague will blow a hole right through the back of your thick skull"._

And so Anna had scurried off with her tail between her legs, leaving Rachel Dawes to her fate. The look that she had in her eyes the last time she had seen her still haunted her dreams… the same as Harvey Dent's horrifically scarred face did…

So now, back at her home, in the early hours of the morning, she plotted her revenge. She had pulled a sports bag out of her cupboard, and into it she threw all the guns and ammo she owned, as well as knives, Tasers… she was determined that if she didn't pull this off then it wouldn't be for lack of shooting.

When she was satisfied that she had packed everything she thought she would need, she finally allowed herself to rest. She was exhausted… and she couldn't remember the last time she had slept. It must have been at the hospital, the day before yesterday…

It took barely a minute before she was out cold.

_It must be your lucky day, officer…_

Anna awoke with a start several hours later, with the dawn sunlight shining through the window onto her face. _It's going to be a beautiful day…_ she thought, bitterly. _I need a coffee_.

She would need the cover of darkness to do what she had planned, which meant she would have to wait until just before nightfall. The club didn't open until seven, and she figured there would be no one there up to about six… so she'd sneak in before then and wait. _God_, she thought. _I can't stand it… I can't stand this feeling in my stomach. If I can't pull this off I might die. I'd rather get it done as quick as I can, than have to wait here for ten hours imagining the pain that I'll go through if I fail…_

The whistling of her kettle mercifully interrupted her thoughts. She took her hot cup of coffee, blowing on it as she lifted it, and walked over to the window. Staring out, she could see groups of people walking past, going about their lives. Across the road there was a playground where children went to have fun… watching them always made her smile. She liked to be reminded of when she was young, a time when she didn't have the responsibilities that she had now. It gave her a warm feeling inside…

One child caught her eye in particular. He was a young boy, maybe twelve or thirteen, sat on one of the swings. He seemed to be… _staring_ straight at her. She squinted, sure that he must have been looking at something else. However hard she looked, though, there was no changing the fact that he was staring straight at her… She shivered, involuntarily. _Creepy_, she thought, but she saw no reason to take it any further.

Instead, she sat down on her couch and drank her coffee. Once she had finished, she quietly washed her mug and walked up her creaking stairs to the bathroom. She slowly took her clothes off, leaving them in a heap on the floor, and stepped into her shower. She savoured the way the water gently hit her skin, letting it wash the tension away. For whatever reason, she took great care in making sure every inch of her body was washed clean.

After drying herself off, she threw her old clothes into her washing machine and switched it on. From her wardrobe, she selected a grey t-shirt and blue jeans and slipped them on. She wasn't at all surprised to find that the intense anger that she had felt when she'd first retuned home had dissipated, being replaced by a cold sense of… _calm_. Calm before the storm, no doubt.

On her way back downstairs she glanced out of the window again. That boy was still sat in the same spot, staring at her, even though more than an hour had passed. For some reason that she couldn't explain, his intense stare made her feel… uncomfortable. Frightened, even. Who was this boy? And what did he want with her? She tried her best to convince herself that she was just being paranoid, but the idea that he was waiting for her niggled at the back of her head until she couldn't resist heading outside to confront him.

Anna slipped on her jacket and pushed open her door. Walking across the street, she realised how detached the boy looked from the children around him. While they were busy laughing and playing, full of life, he simply sat like a statue, swaying gently on the swing. His hair was bleach blond, and it blew around in the breeze. His eyes were a bright blue, but they were narrowed, as though he was deep in thought. They followed Anna as she walked slowly over to him, and his head turned to watch her as she sat down on the empty swing beside him.

The pair sat in silence for several minutes, both simply staring at the traffic passing by. Finally, the boy spoke. "You looked sad", he said, his voice soft.

Ramirez was caught off guard, and looked at him with a shocked expression before her face softened into a smile. "So do you", she replied, and it was true… his eyes were red, which she hadn't been able to see from across the road. He looked as though he'd been crying.

He smiled thinly, and turned to face her. "You first", he said.

Ramirez hesitated. Why was she even considering telling this strange boy how she was feeling? Was she just… desperate to tell anyone? There was definitely something a little… _off_ about him. As though to him there was nothing else in the world at the moment other than the two of them.

"I…" she started, and then hesitated. "My mother just died".

"I'm sorry", he said, and he sounded as though he really meant it.

"I did a lot of things to try and stop it from happening", she continued. "Lots of things I'm not proud of. Things that hurt people, including me. But… now I realise that I never had a chance of stopping it, because some things are just… inevitable…

"But… I can try to make up for the things that I've done. And I mean to do that… soon". Her voice trailed off, and she realised that she _did_ feel better for sharing her thoughts with someone who… wasn't in a coma. She smiled. "Your turn", she said.

The boy looked at her, and then down at the ground. "My mom died nearly a year ago…" he said quietly. "You remember when all of that… gas was released into the narrows? Well, she died then… got killed by... some people. Some of the ones that got out of Arkham. They were wearing those bright orange outfits.

"But I got rescued… first by this woman... I think her name was Rachel, but my memory is still a little fuzzy from then because of the gas. She's dead now, I think… And then we both got rescued by the Batman. He risked his life to go into the narrows to try and help people. Since then he's kind of been my idol. And… one of the reasons I'm upset is because now everyone says that he's a murderer".

Ramirez had put her guard up the instant the boy had mention Rachel… could it have been Rachel Dawes? She had heard that she had been caught up in all of that… nastiness. So what was this kids deal?

"But I don't believe it", he continued. "As soon as I heard it I knew it was all lies. Batman is a _hero_, and people don't even realise it. So I started to investigate things on my own… I've been learning how ever since I first saw Batman, y'know? Trying to be like him? Anyway, I figured out that Batman was in the middle of a fist-fight with an entire SWAT team, trying to stop the Joker from blowing up two ships full of people, when at least one of those people was murdered.

"It was all shown on the news, so I started to wonder… how come no one else has noticed this? it's gotta be a conspiracy, right? But what reason would anyone have to blame these murders on someone who was innocent? Unless… the real murderer was someone important. Someone who, if it ever came out that they'd done these things, it would cause more damage than if it had been hidden. And I hit on Harvey Dent".

Ramirez's eyes had been widening slowly as the boy had been talking. _Who is this kid?_ She thought. "Kid", she protested. "You're barking up the wrong tree. There's no conspiracy, no cover up… Batman murdered those people, end of story". Even as she said the lies, she felt dirty. Hadn't she told herself that she wouldn't lie to people anymore, after all the harm it had done before?

The boy just smiled, thinly. "You don't have to _say_ the words", he said. "You've already answered me with your eyes. I know I'm right… I just wanted to confirm it. Thank you, Lieutenant Ramirez". And with that, he stood and started to walk away, Ramirez staring, mouth open, after him.

When he was about ten yards away, Ramirez managed to speak. "Hey, kid", she shouted. "Who the hell _are_ you?"

The boy turned slowly to face her. "My name's Timmy, ma'am", he replied. "Timmy Drake".


	11. It was Ramirez 11

Ramirez left her car a few hundred yards away from the club. Though she knew she could walk in through the front door if she wanted to, she didn't want them to know that she was there. At least… not until she started making _noise_, anyway. She approached from the back of the building, through the dark, dirty car park. There was a small group of people out there, no doubt drug dealers. She had to fight every fibre of her being to ignore them, but she managed it… she had more important things to think about that night.

Anna was dressed in sheer black. It was a trick she'd learned from… an old colleague. Her sports bag was strapped tightly around her shoulder, so that she didn't need to worry about it slipping away from her. Her gun was strapped to her hip. The calmness that she'd felt briefly through the morning had disappeared completely, replaced by an almost unbearable feeling of dread. If she couldn't pull this off like she'd planned, she would most likely be killed. She knew this, but she remained determined.

The sun hung low in the sky above her, and she could barely see its light beyond the tall buildings that surrounded the club. It was just past five… and time to go to work.

She approached the back door – a rusted brown metal door with a pad lock strapped to its handle. Swinging her bag around, she grabbed the pad lock and shook it, testing its strength. It clanged loudly against the metal handle, but it did not come loose. _OK_, she thought. _It's OK… I planned for this… c__alm down, Anna._

From her bag she dug out a large set of pliers. She glanced behind her at the group of men she had passed by, now on the very far side of the car park, barely in view. They might see her, she realised, but she couldn't worry about that. Instead, she wrapped the pliers around the pad lock and squeezed as hard as she could. The lock did not come loose. Anna took a few deep breaths, shook her arms to try and loosen them, and tried again.

She squeezed with all of her strength, gritting her teeth and using her body weight to push the pliers against the door. Her face went bright red, and her vision started to blur after a few seconds, but eventually – mercifully – the lock came loose, falling broken to the ground.

Anna took a few moments to compose herself, get her breath back and let her eyes recover. She pushed down on the handle, but the door still wouldn't open. There was a second lock on the door. Anna smiled. _This I can handle_, she thought. She spent a moment rummaging in her bag, and pulled out a pair of thin strips of metal… _lock picks_. She silently thanked her brother for being such a massive crook, and for showing her a few of his tricks… though she'd never believed they'd come in useful until that night.

The lock clicked open quickly, and Ramirez grabbed her back and cautiously crept inside. If there _had_ been anyone there, she reasoned, they would have come out to see what all the noise was about. Before she closed the door behind her, she took one more glance over at the group of men in the car park. None of them were even looking in her direction. It seemed that, for now, she was safe.

The door led to a kitchen, which was completely devoid of people. She crept silently alongside the clean pots and pans, straining her ears to try and detect any noise. And when she got closer to the door that led into the main area, she heard something. Voices, she thought, coming closer. She leant against the wall beside the door, and waited, willing them to walk right past and not come through the kitchen.

As the voices got closer, she started to make out some of the words.

"…and then I said 'Hey, if you didn't want it putting in there, then why did you leave it open?'"

"Ha! You're a dick, Mike".

Two men, and they were right outside the door. Ramirez looked nervously at the door handle, waiting for it to make even the slightest movement. She was ready to run if it did. Her hand moved, almost subconsciously, down to her side, and gripped her gun. She knew that if she had to use it now then the whole plan was over… the gunshot would reverberate not just through the whole building, but outside as well.

But, mercifully, the voices began to move away. When she was sure that she could no longer hear them, she slowly opened the door, taking extra care to make sure that she was as silent as she could be. She peeked out through the gap, looking left and then right. The coast was clear… whoever those men had been, they were gone.

The dance floor looked… _strange_ empty, as though there was a piece of it missing. And with the lights switched on, Anna could see all the grim and the muck that the darkness hid during opening hours. And the _smell_… it was almost unbearable. Though cleaners had done their best to cover it up, her nostrils were still overwhelmed by the stench of… smoke and sweat. And vomit. It made her feel nauseous.

She crept upstairs towards the empty office that she had visited three times before. The first time, she remembered, she had been a greedy, self-absorbed witch, desperately pining for whatever she could sell herself for. She thought back on it, and she felt ashamed of herself. The second time she had visited hadn't been much better. She had been consumed with anger, and had rushed in without thinking… and had almost gotten herself killed because of it.

The third… the third time she had been there, she was back to being a _cop – _cool, collected. Back to her old self. And this… the fourth time, she was an avenging angel, and she would make sure that they remembered this night.

The office was cold and dark when she entered. She closed the door behind her, and took a moment to look around. She meant to hide somewhere, and wait for that _bastard_ Ramon to show up. But her eyes were drawn to something on the otherwise empty desk. It was Ramon's lap-top. The same lap-top that held the CCTV footage of her meeting with Maroni, when she had begged him for money and offered to give him whatever he wanted in exchange. It wasn't what she'd come for, but the temptation to look was too hard to resist. She lifted it up and switched it on, but almost immediately she was confronted by security, asking for a password. _Damn_, she thought, but at least she no longer had any reason to let it distract her. She powered it back down.

While doing this, she had noticed that there was another door in this room, at the back. It led to a much smaller cloak room. _Perfect_, she thought. Now she needed to wait. She checked her watch; it was past five thirty. They'd start showing up soon, and she figured they would notice the broken pad lock that she'd purposefully left on the ground outside. Hopefully they'd think that there had been a break-in, which would occupy most of the staff while they tried to figure out what had been taken, leaving her alone with Ramon. That was the plan, anyway.

Anna spent more than fifteen minutes just… waiting, silently. Her nerves were wound tight, but she forced herself to keep her breathing steady, and refused to let her hands shake. She was frightened, yes, but there was also… _excitement_ bubbling underneath. Part of her couldn't wait for them to show up, so that she could act. Was this how the Batman felt before he struck?

Finally, she heard voices approaching the room. The click of the office door opening came as blessed relief for Anna, who thought that she wouldn't be able to stand waiting much longer.

"- and find out what those bastards took!"

It was Ramon's voice, and it was angry. It gave Anna a warm feeling inside; it seemed that her plan had worked. They believed that there had been a robbery, and rather than calling the police they were searching the building themselves.

"Get out there and join the search", Ramon shouted. "Find out who they are and what they took. Those bastards will be sorry that they fucked with me!"

"Yes, boss", another man grunted – Anna guessed that it was Ramon's bodyguard, who had held a gun to her head. "Uh… what about opening the club?"

"The club opens as normal. I'm not gonna let some little fuckers mess up my business. I'm gonna stay here and check the CCTV", Ramon continued. "See if we didn't catch their dumb-ass faces". Anna's eyes widened. What had he said before? _Everything in this office is recorded?_ If he checked the footage of the last hour in his office, he would see her entering, and he would see her hiding in this room.

She heard the door open and close, and realised that she was now alone with Ramon, just like she had planned. She gripped her gun in her hand, and readied herself to move. She knew that she had to incapacitate him before he could call for help, and then barricade the door closed and hope that no one else showed up.

Gently pushing the door open, she saw the back of Ramon's head as he accessed his laptop. He was so close… close enough to touch. But she forced herself to wait for the right moment. That moment came soon after, as Ramon began watching the recent CCTV footage of his office. Anna could see herself on the screen over his shoulder, sneaking into the room. She felt Ramon tense up as he watched her failed attempt at accessing his laptop, and as she crept inside the cloak room.

There was a pause after the footage finished – a horrible, silent pause, as both of them waited for the other to make a move. It was Ramon who moved first, trying to grab the gun that he kept strapped underneath his desk. But Anna was quicker. She burst through the door behind him and struck him as hard as she could on the back of the head with the butt of her gun. His body slumped to the floor, leaving her standing over him panting.

While he was unconscious, she dragged him up into his own chair and removed rope and hand-cuffs from her bag. She used them to strap him down tightly. Then she took the other empty chair and wedged it underneath the handle of the door to the office. She knew that if anyone tried to open the door and found that they couldn't they would realise that something was wrong, but at least it would give her a few moments to try and figure out a way to escape.

When she was satisfied that everything was as it should be, she sat down on the desk in front of him. She looked him over briefly – now that he was tied down, gagged and helpless, she realised that he was just another guy. Nothing special, and certainly nothing to be afraid of.

_Time to go to work_, she thought, and smiled.

She slapped him hard across the face. "Hey!" she said, quietly but firmly. "Wake up, asshole".

His eyes opened wide with fright, and Ramirez savoured the sight. She had to admit, striking fear into the hearts of criminals made her feel a lot better. She could understand why _he_ did it.

"Mmmm" he mumbled, trying to scream through his gag.

"Shhhh", Ramirez said, lifting her gun up and pointing it at his head. "Now", she said, her voice gentle. "I'm going to take off your gag. If you scream, or shout for help, I'm going to shoot you in the face, understand?" He nodded, and she gently removed the gag from around his mouth.

"You fucking bitch", he said. "You are so dead. Your life won't be worth spit after this. And don't think for a second that I believe you'll shoot me. Cops don't shoot people".

Anna leaned in close to him, and rubbed the barrel of her gun across his face. "Didn't you say last time I was here that I was stupid if I thought I was still a cop?" she said, and grinned widely. Despite herself, she was enjoying this. "It's only a matter of time before they find out what I did, right? So what have I got to lose?"

There was a long pause as Ramon considered what she had said, trying to decide whether or not he believed her. Behind them, the pounding bass of the club music had started. Anna smiled. "Right on cue", she said.

Then, to her surprise and disgust, Ramon spat on her. "Fuck you", he spat.

Anna slowly wiped the spit from her face. The smile had fallen away, replaced by a fierce stare. "That", she growled, "was a mistake".

Without warning, she lowered her gun and pressed it against his leg and, smiling, she pulled the trigger. The bang of her gun firing almost deafened her, and she prayed that the music outside was loud enough to cover it up. If it wasn't, she knew, then they wouldn't be alone for much longer.

Ramon tried to scream but Anna covered his mouth roughly with her hand, stifling it. When he'd calmed down, she took her hand away. "Now", she said, soothingly. "I hope we won't have any more outbursts like that".

Ramon was panting hard by that point. He looked at her, anger in his face. "What do you want?" he spat.

"I want the woman with the red glasses", she growled back. "I want to know who she is, who she works for and where to find her".

To her surprise, Ramon laughed. "You have no idea what you're getting into", he said. "This is so much bigger than you…"

He was interrupted by another hard slap from Ramirez. "I don't care", she yelled. "Just tell me".

There was another brief pause, but Anna could tell from his expression that he knew he had no choice. When she had shot him in the leg it had surprised her almost as much as him. Who knew that she had _that_ inside her? How far was she willing to go with this?

"She…" he said. "All I know is a codename. _Shiva_. She works for an… organisation. Not for me, not for the mob. They're like… a spook story, y'know? Something that mobsters have nightmares about. And, like it or not, they've got plans for Gotham".

"So…" Ramirez said. "You don't know her real name, or where to find her, or where she comes from? You're not doing your chances any good, y'know".

Ramon smiled bitterly. "Pass me my laptop", he sighed. "I met her in here, and everything's recorded".

Ramirez slid the laptop over to him, and untied one of his arms. Holding her gun to his head, she made sure to watch as he entered his password. _Black Mask…_ she thought. _Strange password._ _I need to remember that._

It took a few seconds for him to load up the relevant document, but when he did Anna recognised the woman she saw immediately.

It was Agent Rudra, no mistake. She had red glasses and a wig, but it was definitely her. _That bitch_, she thought. _She smiled at me… and then had the nerve to accuse _me.

She slammed the laptop shut and shoved it into her bag. She was about to hit Ramon over the head again to knock him out, but he spoke before she could.

"One thing you _should_ probably know…" he said menacingly. "That footage was taken about five minutes before our first meeting in here. You remember? When you demanded that I hold up Maroni's end of your bargain? The file is rigged so that you can't manipulate it. You can't delete the parts with you in without deleting the entire footage. So, _officer_… what's more important? Catching your killer, or hiding the truth about yourself?" And then he started to laugh.

_Fuck_, Anna thought, as she hit him hard across the head, leaving him unconscious again. She stood there for a moment, thinking… what was she going to do? This was the only evidence they had, along with the tiny fragment of her glasses. But she couldn't hand it over to Gordon or he'd know everything about her betrayal.

She shook her head, trying to shake away the thoughts. This was no time for her to worry about all of that shit. She was still in danger, she knew, until she got out of that club.

But, as it turned out, that was the easiest part of that whole night. She moved the chair away from the door and walked out calmly, closing the door gently behind her. She walked down the spiral staircase, through the crowd of people that had already formed on the dance floor, and out of the front door. The bouncers gave her questioning looks as she walked past them, but she didn't even slow down for them. She just carried on walking, all the way to her car.


	12. It was Ramirez 12

"Sorry, Anna, but she checks out fine".

Anna sat in the remains of the MCU office, her phone stuck to her ear. Although she had only been a cop for a few years, she'd built up a small network of contacts. It was one of these contacts that she was talking to, and his voice that she heard through her phone.

His name was Colin, and he was a _fed _– an FBI agent. Since the revelations at the mob club the night before, she'd been trying to figure out how she was going to _play_ things. Her first instinct had been to march back here and _scream_ her accusations to anyone who would listen. But then she remembered her little _interview_ with Rudra, when she had all but accused Anna of committing these murders herself. Even if the others… if _Gordon_… believed that Rudra was the killer, it would mean nothing without evidence.

"So she's really with the FBI?" she asked.

_Evidence_. Her mind kept wandering back to the footage that she'd taken from _Ramon_, along with his lap-top. She had no doubt that, if she looked, it would prove to be a treasure chest of evidence, not just against Ramon and his cronies, but everything he'd managed to drag up on his competitors. As it was, though, all that she could think of was the incriminating footage of her.

"Yeah", Colin replied. "She's been an agent for a few years. By all accounts, she's been a huge success at it too. Word is, she'd on her way to the top fast".

Anna had thought she was _past_ all this… the desperation for her own self-preservation, the reluctance to come clean. Apparently not.

She sighed. "OK, Colin", she said. "Thanks anyway". In truth, she hadn't expected to find anything in her back story. She had no doubt that Gordon had her checked out thoroughly when she first arrived, but she chose to double check just in case. No… she was a _professional_. She wouldn't have allowed anything to slip by if she could possibly avoid it, which made the tiny piece of a red lens that she'd dropped in Anderson's apartment the only evidence she had. _The only _useable_ evidence_, she corrected, mentally.

A door slammed open at the far side of the room, and Commissioner Gordon walked in. It was the first time Anna had seen him since before Stephens was killed, and her first instinct was to grab him and tell him everything she knew about Rudra. No doubt she would have, if the cold, emotionless face of Agent Rudra hadn't followed him through the door.

"Five minutes, everyone", he said loudly, addressing everyone in the room. "Then we'll head out".

It was the day of Harvey Dent's memorial. Thousands were expected to crowd into the centre of Gotham to mourn, while the Mayor and Gordon, along with some selected other important people, would pay their own respects. _I wonder what he's feeling…_ Anna thought. _Having to pretend that Harvey didn't try to kill his son… that he didn't murder two of our friends_. _ If he feels anything like me… I don't know how he'll manage_.

In some ways, Anna was grateful that she had something on her mind to distract her from this… _disgusting_ sham of a memorial. Harvey's horrifically disfigured face still haunted her every time she closed her eyes, and the way he'd gambled her life on the flip of a coin… as though is hadn't meant anything. She knew that she had been partly to blame for the horrible things that had happened to him, but the decision to start killing people had been _his_… and his alone.

She shook her head, trying to shake off thoughts of the day ahead. In an effort to distract herself, she turned to the computer on her desk and accessed the police database. She tried entering a few names… _Rudra_ brought up nothing, like she expected. _Shiva_ the same.

She tried searching for _Ramon_, to see what the cops had on him. To her surprise, their files were quite substantial. He was a businessman, of a sort. Recently he'd been put in charge of managing the various banks in Gotham that were used to launder Maroni's money, before Gordon and the Bat had managed to shut them down.

And then another name popped into her head. _What was his name…_ she thought, trying to remember. _Timmy… Timmy Drake_.

The police had records for him and his father, who had been in and out of jail for minor crimes most of his life. Most recently, Timmy's father had been in court accused of assaulting his ex-wife, who Anna realised must have been the mother that Timmy had told her about. The case was thrown out for lack of evidence, leaving no reason to deny him custody of his son when his ex-wife had died.

"Time to go, Anna", a voice said from behind, interrupting her reading. She turned to see the solemn face of Gordon staring down at her. They shared a… _look_… as though each knew what the other was thinking, and understood. And then he walked away, and over towards Agent Rudra.

Anna watched as they smiled at each other before Gordon walked through the door. Rudra turned and caught Anna's gaze, and the two stared at each other momentarily before Anna broke eye contact. _I'll get you, bitch_, she thought. _Somehow I will_.

After a brief moment, she opened her desk drawer. A microphone and recorder were laying there, staring up at her.

* * *

The memorial was in full swing when they arrived. There must have been ten thousand people lining the streets, Anna thought as she stepped out of her car. She took a few steps towards the seats before she saw what was hanging over the stage. A fifteen foot image of Harvey Dent's face hung there, staring down at her. No matter how hard she tried, she couldn't look at it without seeing the _burn scars_. She lowered her head so that she was staring at the ground and carried on walking slowly to her chair.

The Mayor was the first to take to the stage, wearing a black suit.

"Thank you all for coming", he said into the microphone. "We all know why we're here. We're here to mourn our city's lost saviour, Harvey Dent, who was cruelly taken from us in his prime. But this shouldn't just be a day for mourning. We're also here to celebrate his life, and everything he did for the city and, more importantly, the people who live in it".

_Everything he did for us…_ Anna thought bitterly. _I wonder… if these people were told the truth, would they believe it, or would they just deny it?_

"Harvey was voted in as District Attorney after an unprecedented level of support both from within the Attorney's offices and from the people of Gotham. People who _believed _in Harvey Dent. _I _believed in Harvey Dent, and I still do. The good that he did in his life is still all around us for everyone to see. The streets are safer, and people can sleep easier at night. I can't think of anyone else who can claim to have had such a massive impact on our lives.

"So… I would like to invite everyone here to stand and give a round of applause, in honour of Harvey". And then the Mayor started to clap his hands, alone at first but soon joined by the crowd. Anna sat still in her chair, staring at her feet, refusing to applaud. People around her stood, and the applause grew and grew until it sounded like thunder reverberating between the buildings. Ramirez glanced up towards the stage, and saw that Gordon was standing and applauding along with everyone else. Reluctantly, Anna slowly got to her feet and clapped her own hands together.

It went on for three agonising minutes. When it had finally died down, and the people around her had returned to their chairs, Anna sat down and went back to staring at her feet.

"Now", the Mayor continued. "I would like to invite Commissioner Gordon to say a few words". More applause followed as Gordon stood and approached the microphone, shaking the Mayor's hand. Anna's eyes lifted slightly, so that she could just see the expression on his face. She knew that this must be killing him, but his face was remarkably calm and composed. He seemed determined to keep up this façade for as long as he needed to.

"Harvey Dent", Gordon began, "was a hero. Not the hero we deserved but the hero we needed. Nothing less than a knight… shining".

Anna couldn't listen to any more. She stood and quickly walked away from the stage, ignoring the looks that the people in the crowd were giving her. Before she got to the end of the seats she caught sight of Agent Rudra, stood at the back, staring at the stage.

After a brief moment of thought, Anna walked up to her.

"Rudra", she said quietly. "I need to speak to you".

Rudra turned to face her, giving her the same look of contempt that she had worn the last time they had spoken. "Okay, officer", she sighed. "Go ahead".

"Not here", Anna said hurriedly. "Somewhere private. I know who murdered Anderson, Lee and Stephens".

Anna savoured the way Rudra's eyes widened momentarily, before she could stop herself. _That got her attention_, she thought.

"Lieutenant", Rudra replied. "If you have information about this case then you need to tell me right now".

"I _can't_", Anna whispered, before leaning in closer to Rudra. "I think that there are people on the inside… _in the MCU_. They can't be trusted. I need to meet you somewhere private. Just tell me when and where".

There was a brief pause while Rudra considered what Anna was saying. There was no way she would refuse, Anna knew… the thought that someone knew her secrets would be too tempting for her to ignore. And so it proved.

"Meet me outside my hotel", she said eventually. "It's on forty-fifth street. _King's Hotel_. You know it? Tonight. At nine".

Anna nodded, and then walked away. _Nine…_ she thought. _That's when this all ends._


	13. It was Ramirez 13

Anna Ramirez was afraid, and not for the first time. As she sat in her car, she stared across the street at the King's Hotel, and she could feel a familiar coldness moving from her stomach through her chest, and into her head. This time, though, this horrible feeling wasn't caused by doubts over what the future might hold – whether she would be able to prevent her secrets from being revealed. This time, her fear came from a piercing sense of _clarity_. Anna knew _exactly_ how this night was going to end… and she was afraid of it.

As the rain splattered into the roof of her car, Anna took a deep breath and tried to calm her racing heart. There was no turning back, she knew, and as she pushed open the rusted door of her worn out car, she realised that however badly this night might end; she didn't _want_ to turn back.

There was a dim glow coming from the hotel across the street. Its doors were closed tightly, and most of the windows were covered by curtains, but the sign hanging above the doors still glowed. Anna shoved her hands into her pockets and hunched her coat up, and tried to hide herself away from the rain.

Her heart was pounding in her chest – with excitement, with nervousness – and it seemed as though her senses had heightened. She thought she could see and hear every drop of rain that splashed to the ground around her as she walked towards the hotel.

Three yards from the door, Anna realised that someone was watching her from the shadows; she glanced across, but could only make out a silhouette. She slid her hand slowly into her jacket and gripped her gun, but she didn't stop walking. Whoever it was – and whether or not they meant her any harm – she didn't want them to know that she'd seen them.

A car passed behind her, and its headlights illuminated the figure briefly – it was Rudra, waiting for her.

Anna stopped walking just before the entrance to the hotel, and looked across at Rudra. They stared at each other for a moment, each trying to read the other. It was Anna who broke the silence first.

"I thought we were going to do this in your hotel room", she said. As she spoke, she turned her body to face Rudra and folded her arms across her chest.

Rudra smiled – the same fake smile that she had flashed at Anna a dozen times before. "It's not secure", she sighed. "Call me paranoid, but I don't trust the staff here. They ask too many questions".

_And I bet you just hate that, _Ramirez thought. She stayed silent.

"There's a back alley behind the building", Rudra continued. "No one will bother us there".

Rudra motioned for Anna to follow her, but she hesitated. She hadn't really expected this to go down in the hotel – Rudra would want Anna to talk to as few people as possible, so that there was no record of her being here – but the idea of going with a serial murderer into a dark and secluded alleyway didn't appeal to her.

Still, she realised, if she didn't take the risks then she'd never reach the prize. She shuffled forward after Rudra, and stared intently at the back of her head as they walked.

When Rudra had said that no one would bother them in the alleyway, she wasn't kidding. They moved toward the back end of the alley, sandwiched between the hotel on one side and the old opera house on the other, and from back there Anna could barely hear the sound of the passing cars.

Anna looked around and tried to take stock of her surroundings – she looked for possible escape routes if things went bad, for weapons, and hiding places. There were none. Even the back door of the opera house was padlocked shut, as it had been for years.

They stood there for a moment in the rain. Anna glanced upward, towards the tops of the tall buildings that they were sandwiched between. Water was pouring from the sloped roof of the opera house. She watched it flow down to where they stood, and it made it harder to see clearly.

"You said you knew who was behind the murders", Rudra said. Her voice mirrored the calmness in her face. "A cop, you said".

Ramirez flashed a brief smile. _Here goes… _

"You didn't really buy that, did you?" she asked, and she paced slowly towards Rudra. She tried to fill her voice with confidence, but in her own head she sounded small and frightened. She hoped that Rudra had heard it differently. As she moved, she absent mindedly put her hand in her coat pocket, and fingered the recorder that she had hidden there. She hoped to god that it was picking up this conversation over the sound of the rain splashing to the ground around them.

Rudra smiled… at least with her mouth. Her eyes were piercing holes straight through Anna, who wanted nothing more than to run away and hide. Anna knew that Rudra was looking for the slightest flicker, the tiniest waver in the façade of confidence that she was trying to build up.

"I guess not", Rudra said softly. She moved across to the wall and leant against it, and as she did she folded her arms across her chest. She frowned. "When did you find out?" she asked.

"Does it matter?" Anna replied. She smiled and did her best to act intimidating, while inside she was as terrified as she had ever been. If this was going to work, she needed Rudra to make a complete confession while she was recording her. That or she needed her to commit some other crime while she was there. "What matters is where we go from here".

Rudra laughed. "So, you're not here to try to arrest me…" she said. "I'm assuming you're looking for some kind of deal. Why don't you just cut the crap and tell me what you want?"

"I want the same thing that everyone wants", Anna said quickly. "I want money".

Rudra walked slowly towards her until they were barely a foot apart. "Still trying to pay those medical bills, huh?" she asked. Anna's eyes must have flickered, because a wide grin spread across Rudra's lips. "Why so surprised? We know all about you, Lieutenant. Every dirty little secret. And we know exactly what really happened to Harvey Dent. What I don't know is why you're alive when he murdered everyone else".

_Damn, _Anna thought. Now that Rudra had mentioned Dent, it meant that even if she tricked her into confessing, they couldn't use the recording from the wire Anna was wearing. It would undo everything that Gordon was working toward.

But that wasn't the top of her priority list. She would worry about the recording later, after she had coerced a confession from Rudra's lips.

How did Rudra know so much? Anna knew that Rudra had some kind of deal with the mob, but why would they have told her about their deal with Anna? It didn't change anything, she knew. In fact, it would make it easier to convince Rudra that she would stay quiet for money. After all, she thought bitterly, she'd done it before.

"Who's 'we'?" Anna asked.

"You wouldn't believe me if I told you", Rudra smirked. "Let's just say that… a _reckoning _is coming, and I'm blazing the trail".

_There's my opportunity, _Anna thought. She frowned, though she tried to keep the smile on her face.

"How does killing three people blaze a trail for anything?" she asked. She had to force her voice not to quiver as she spoke. This was the moment – Rudra would either realise that she was being set up, or she would give Anna the confession that she was looking for.

Rudra opened her mouth to speak, and Anna's heart rose into her mouth. But no words came. Instead, they were interrupted by a sound – a rustling sound – coming from a pile of discarded trash bags at the side of the alley.

Both women turned to watch as one of the bags slowly became dislodged, and rolled down to the ground between them. But their eyes didn't follow the bag as it moved. Instead, they remained transfixed on the place that the bag was, and what it had exposed behind it.

There, staring out at them, was the frightened and pale face of a young boy. And, even worse, it was a boy that Anna recognised.

It was Timmy Drake.

_Shit_, Anna's voice screamed in her head. _Where did he come from? _It was clear from his face that he knew what kind of trouble he was in. Anna watched dumbfounded as Timmy struggled to get to his feet and escape. He didn't even get close. Rudra moved with a speed that Anna hadn't seen before, and grabbed Timmy hard on his neck.

Timmy screamed as she viciously dragged him from his hiding place. She clamped her hand over his mouth to muffle his screams, and stood him in front of her so that they were both facing Anna.

"Well now", Rudra purred, her voice suddenly filled with sadistic confidence. "What do we have here? A little spy, listening in on things that he shouldn't be".

Anna looked at Timmy. There was something... strange about him. He didn't even struggle... he just accepted it. Even if he had struggled, Anna doubted he would have been able to break the firm grip that Rudra had around his neck.

Rudra turned her attention back to Anna. "This is a problem, isn't it?" she said.

Anna was desperately trying to think of what to do. Rudra still hadn't given her the confession that she needed, and she couldn't think of a way to help Timmy without revealing that the whole conversation had been a set-up. No matter how much she hated the idea, the only thing she could do was wait, and hope that an opportunity presented itself.

And it had all been going so well…

"We need to take care of this", Rudra continued. "And by 'we' I mean… _you_". Anna's eyes widened, and Rudra laughed. "If you want to strike a deal with me, then you have to prove that you're genuine. And the only way I'll believe you is if you have as much to lose as me. So…" Rudra's free hand moved to her pocket, and she pulled out a knife. She held it by the blade and offered the handle to Ramirez. "I want you to take this knife – the knife that killed three of your _colleagues_ – and cut this little boy's throat".

That was it, Anna realised. The confession that she'd been waiting for. Now all she needed to do was get herself and the boy out of there alive. She glanced down at him. He was staring at her. But, to her surprise, his eyes weren't pleading... they were urging her on. What had happened to him since the last time they had met to make him so... eager to die? Of course, she realised, he didn't know that it was all a set-up.

Anna walked towards Rudra and Timmy. Her hand rose slowly towards the knife, and as it wrapped around the handle she took a deep breath.

Her other hand darted forward, and grabbed Timmy by his jacket. Then she pulled both of her hands sharply towards herself, throwing Timmy away behind her and yanking the knife from Rudra's hand.

"Run!" she yelled to Timmy.

Her _plan_ was to pull her gun on Rudra. Her _plan_ was to arrest her there and then. But, she realised bitterly, her life had never exactly gone to plan.

There was a loud bang, and she suddenly felt a strange… _aching_ in her stomach. She looked down, shocked, and saw the blood start to stain her shirt. She tried to lift her head, but the energy had drained from her body. The next thing she knew, her legs gave way and she fell hard to the floor.

Anna could see Timmy. He was maybe ten yards away, near the end of the alley. She heard the sound of gunfire – it seemed to come from a long way away. It took almost all of her strength, but she managed to turn her head to look upwards. Rudra was firing a gun, trying to kill the boy.

God, her stomach felt like it was on fire. She knew that she was dead, but it didn't matter. Her hands moved on their own as they slid across the ground towards Rudra's feet. She had to give Timmy time to get away.

Her hands wrapped themselves around Rudra's ankles, and she used the last of her strength to throw the weight of her body at her. Rudra fell to the ground – Anna thought she could hear a yelp of pain, and that made her feel good. Rudra's legs flailed wildly, kicking at Anna's face. She barely felt the blows.

But, however hard she tried, Anna couldn't keep hold of Rudra forever. Her legs slid free, and although Anna's vision had already started to darken, she had to watch as Rudra climbed to her feet.

Anna saw the horrible look on Rudra's face. She looked down at Anna as though she were nothing but dirt on the ground. Then Anna saw her lift the gun that she still held, and point it straight at Anna's face.

In that last moment, Anna realised how much she wanted to live…

And then everything went dark.

* * *

**Afterword**

_Okay, so I figured I'd add a little explanation about what 'Tales From Gotham City' is. Basically, it's a bunch of stories - four or five by the end, I think, plus some shorter one offs - which are individual, but link together to make one larger story. So at the moment there are three, which are;_

**It Was Ramirez** - a story about what happened to Anna Ramirez after the Dark Knight

**It's Not Who I Am Underneath** - a story about a young boy devastated by the lies about the Batman

**Your Hands Look Plenty Filthy To Me** - which explores how Jim Gordon copes after The Dark Knight with both the lies, and his life in Gotham (this is currently in progress)

_Each is its own story, focussing on a different character in the Nolanverse, but each one links to the others. If you like this story, then please read the others too._

_There are also a few substories - things I wrote in about an hour or so, which are not important to the overall story but just flesh it out a little. If you're interested, they are;_

**Brian** - a story about Brian, the fake Batman

**Who Picked Up Rachel** - a story about Rachel's final moments

**Coleman Reese** - a (very grim) exploration of what happened to Coleman Reese after Bruce Wayne saved his life


End file.
